UC-NRLF 


ON    GUARD. 


BY    ANNIE    THOMAS, 

AUTHOR  OP 
"DENIS  DONNE"  AND  "THEO  LEIGH." 


NEW  YOEK: 
HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  PUBLISHERS, 

FBANKLIN  SQUABE. 
1865. 


ALUMNUS 


Novels  by  Miss  Annie  Thomas. 


DENIS   DONNE.      A  Nowel.      By  ANNIE   THOMAS.      8vo,  Paper,  50    cents. 

THEO    LEIGH.      A  Novel.      By  ANNIE   THOMAS,  Author   of  "Denis   Donne." 
8vo,  Paper,  50  cents. 

ON    GUARD.      A  Novel.      By  ANNIE  THOMAS,  Author  of  "Theo   Leigh"    and 
"Denis  Donne."     8vo,  Paper,  50  cents. 


Extracts  from,  English  Notices. 


Miss  Thomas'B  writing  is  fresh  and  vigorous.  Her  sketches  of 
character  are  full  of  cleverness,  and  Theo  Leigh  confirms  the  im- 
pression made  by  Denii  Donne,  that  the  writer  may  take  a  fore- 
most place  in  modern  fiction. — Saturday  Review. 

Miss  Thomas  displays  an  even  vigor  of  diction  which  few  of  her 
sex  possess.  Strong  power  of  language  and  clear  definition  are 
Miss  Thomas's  principal  resources. — Athencevm. 

Its  characters  ("Denis  Donae"),  men  and  women  whom  every 


body  has  met,  are  drawn  with  wonderful  vigor,  freedom,  and 
freshness.— The  Prtit. 

Miss  Thomas  need  not  have  either  doubt  or  fear  as  to  the  place 
which  will  be  awarded  her  among  our  modern  novelists.— Morn- 
ing Pott. 

Miss  Thomas  will,  we  think,  rank  high  among  that  class  of 
novelists  of  whom  Miss  Evans  (George  Eliot)  is  the  first.— 
Eeader. 


PUBLISHED  BY  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  NEW  YORK. 


Sent  by  Mail,  postage  free,  to  any  part  of  the  United  States,  on  receipt  of  the  Price. 


ON   GUAED. 


CHAPTEE  L 
LADY  VILLARS'  KETTLEDRUM. 

THE  first  scene  opens  as  the  last  one  will  close 
probably,  quietly  enough ;  for  this  is  to  be  no 
story  of  guilt  and  horror,  of  murder,  mystery, 
or  machinations.  The  actors  ih  it  will  be  of 
the  order  amon-gst  whom  we  live  and  move  and 
have  our  being.  Upon  these  I,  their  historian, 
will  rely  for  creating  an  interest  to  the  full  as 
deep  and  true  as  can  be  obtained  by  the  power- 
ful pourtrayal  of  any  or  all  of  the  cardinal 
vices. 

The  season  was  June.  Time,  four  in  the 
afternoon.  Place,  the  drawing-room  of  a  house 
in  a  certain  fashionable  street  in  the  May  Fair 
district :  a  street  which  shall  be  nameless,  be- 
cause not  a  house  in  it  stands  empty  at  present, 
and  the  occupants  of  any  given  number  might 
feel  annoyed,  might  experience  just  indignation, 
at  having  their  residence  so  plainly  indicated. 

Here  I  will  pause  for  a  paragraph  or  two  in 
my  story,  to  ask  whether  any  teller  of  tales  in 
print,  past,  present,  or  to  come,  may  hope  to 
avoid  this  cruelest  wrong  of  all,  of  being  ac- 
cused of  maligning  places  and  persons,  and  dis- 
torting in  recital  occurrences  which  some  wise- 
acre or  other  in  perusal  is  sure  to  discover  is 
"  meant  for  so-and-so,  and  such-and-such."  It 
is  a  bitter  drop  in  the  cup  of  fame,  popularity, 
or  whatever  one  may  be  fortunate  enough  to 
attain,  to  hear  from  a  third  and  candid  acquaint- 
ance that  the  friend  of  your  heart  is  cut  to  that 
organ  by  your  obvious  allusion  to  him  or  her  at 
p.  44 !  Or  that  the  feelings  of  some  one  whom 
you  deemed  too  sensible,  too  quick  of  compre- 
hension, to  be  affected  by  it  for  a  moment,  are 
wrung  because  your  promptitude  of  pen,  and 
pride  of  power  in  producing  copy,  has  led  you 
into  the  unwitting  error  of  dubbing  lodgings  in 
the  locality  in  which  said  supposed  sensible  one 
once  dwelt,  "fly-blown."  Ah  me!  since  all 
have  faults  and  follies  either  on  or  under  the 
surface,  to  the  one  to  whom  is  given  the  deli- 
cate tact  to  avoid  mention  or  allusion  to  all  or 
any  of  said  faults  and  follies  be  all  praise  and 
glory !  But  not  mine  the  latter,  since  not  mine 
the  gift. 

I  have  made  my  plea.  I  have  indicated  that 
I  intend  to  indicate  nobody  in  particular,  nor 
to  allude  disparagingly  to  any  special  place. 
Should  I  be  so  extremely  unfortunate  as  to  do 
other  than  I  intend,  I  here  crave  the  pardon  of 
the  offended,  but  nevertheless  proceed  with  my 
story. 

The  season  was  June,  and  the  time  four  in 
the  afternoon.     After  this,  need  it  be  added 
it  the  guests  at  Lady  Villars'   kettledrum 


tha 


were  rather  warm  and  very  sleepy.  "  Tea  and 
a  little  music"  on  a  Midsummer  afternoon  are 
strangely  conducive  to  the  "  brother  of  death" 
(vide  Shelley)  obtaining  at  the  least  a  partial 
.sway. 

There  was  a  lull  in  the  entertainment.  A 
pretty  girl  had*  just  ceased  singing ;  or,  rather, 
had  just  ceased  listening  blushiugly  to  the 
gentle  "bravas"  which  some  amiable,  well- 
meaning  men  had  bestowed  upon  her.  Silence 
had  fallen  over  everything,  and  Lady  Villars 
began  to  think  herself  an  unwise  woman  in 
having  thus  collected  a  throng  without  suffi- 
cient cause. 

For  the  brightest  luminaries  in  her  circle  had 
refused  to  grace  this  afternoon  re-union  of  hers. 
She  had  beguiled  the  many  here  to-day  with 
the  promise  of  some  special  shining  on  the  part 
of  some  bright  particular  stars.  The  bright 
particular  stars  having  disappointed  her,  the 
many  were  cross,  and  showed  that  they  were 
so;  albeit,  they  belonged  to  the  upper  ter 
thousand,  and  were  Lady  Villars1  dear  and  de- 
voted friends. 

It  was  not  an  unpleasant  place  in  which  t< 
be  warm  and  sleepy,  this  room  of  Lady  Villars. 
A  double  drawing-room,  with  a  conservatory  at 
one  end  and  a  bay  window  draped  with  rose- 
coloured  silk  at  the  other.  A  drawing-room, 
the  corners  of  which,  through  the  skilful  ad- 
justment of  furniture,  were  many.  A  room 
that  was  replete  with  quiet  nooks,  though  it 
was  at  the  same  time  an  eminently  comfortable 
and  sociable-looking  apartment.  A  room  in 
which  it  was  impossible  for  any  one  to  hear  ail- 
that  was  said  to  everybody  by  everybody  else. 
A  room  that  looked  as  though  natural  taste  and 
careful  cultivation  had  presided  over  its  adorn- 
ment. Yet,  withal,  a  room  that  was  much  like 
many  another  one  in  the  neighbourhood. 

As  for  the  people  who  filled  it,  they  were  as 
void  of  singularity  as  the  place  they  filled. 
Picture  to  yourselves,  you  who  may  read  these 
pages,  a  group  of  English  gentlemen  and  ladies 
of  all*  ages  standing  about  in  a  state  of  idle 
irresolution,  until  the  carriages  which  were  or- 
dered at  five  should  be  announced  for  their 
redemption  from  this  sleepy  slavery. 

The  pretty  girl  who  had  just  received  mild 
plaudits  from  the  listless  throng  was  the  second 
daughter  of  the  house,  Florence  Villars.  She 
is  to  be  one  of  the  heroines  of  this  book :  there- 
fore her  charms  shall  be  sung  in  full. 

Hers  was  a  moulded,  not  a  chiseled  face,  yet 
it  was  an  exceedingly  delicate,  or,  rather,  per- 
haps, I  should  say  an  exceedingly  refined  one. 
Her  face  was  fresh  and  glowing  in  hue.  Had 
her  hair  been  black  or  brown  her  complexion 
5Wjjj  have  appeared  fair.  As  it  was,  the  bright 
>*  ?**: 


ON  GUARD. 


golden  locks  that  were  folded  smoothly  back 
over  her  ears,  arid  arranged  in  a  large  loop  be- 
hind her  head,  caused  the  skin  that  knew  more 
of  the  rose  than  the  lily  to  appear  almost  dark. 

For  all  this  violation  of  the  usual  laws  of  Na- 
ture's colouring,  Florry  Villars  was  a  very 
lovely  girl  The  shape  of  her  head — the  yield- 
ing lines  of  her  full  rounded  figure — the  man- 
ner of  her  movements — all  these  were  perfect. 
Her  aquiline  nose  was  as  utterly  devoid  of 
strong-mindedness  and  severity  as  the  veriest 
snub  could  have  been.  Her  hazel  eyes  were 
as  tender  as  the  deepest  blue  that  ever  adorned 
another  woman's  face.  While  as  for  the  gentle 
retreat  her  rounded  chin  made,  it  was  women 
and  women  alone  who  had  the  heart  to  suggest 
that  it  betrayed  "weakness  of  character." 
Artists,  and,  indeed,  men  generally,  held  that 
it  was  all  that  a  woman's  chin  should  be. 

She  had  a  very  sweet  smile,  this  lovely  Miss 
Florry  Yillars:  a  charming  smile — warm  and 
pure  as  a  sunbeam.  All  that  portion,  of  the 
world  which  came  in  contact  with  her  knew 
her  smile;  for  it  was  rarely  absent  from  the 
soft  ruddy  lips  and  the  kind  hazel  eyes.  But 
at  this  moment  when  I  introduce  her  there  was 
more  softness  on  the  lips,  and  more  kindness  in 
the  eyes,  and  more  sweetness  in  the  smile,  than 
any  one  present  had  ever  remarked  before. 

"  I  am  glad  you  liked  the  song,"  she  mur- 
mured, glancing  up  towards  a  man  who  leant 
against  the  wall  at  the  end  of  the  piano. 

"  I  liked  it  so  well  that  I  want  you  to  sit 
down  and  sing  it  again,  Florry." 

"  Oh,  Claude,  don't  ask  me !  "What  would 
mamma  say  ?" 

"I  don't  care  what  mamma  would  say;  I 
want  the  song,"  he  replied  authoritatively.  "  I 
want  to  hear  it  again,  Florry.  I  did  not  come 
here  to  listen  to  the  squalls  of  that  fat  woman 
in  green  silk ;  and  as  for  the  little  Grey  girl,  she 
opens  her  mouth  square,  and  tacks  on  a  '  ra'  to 
the  end  of  every  word  that  she  breathes  upon. 
I  came  to  hear  you,  and  I  want  to  hear  you 
again  at  once." 

Claude  Walsingham  infused  a  strong  flavour 
of  flattery  into  the  words  he  used ;  so  strong  a 
flavour,  in  fact,  that  it  robbed  the  words  of  all 
their  arbitrariness  and  selfish  unpoliteness  to 
her  ears.  She  moved  a  little  nearer  to  him,  and 
whispered — 

"  Don't  make  me  sing  again,  Claude,  just  yet. 
I  want  to  speak  to  you :  I  have  great  news  to 
tell  you." 

The  man  she  addressed  stood  erect  in  an  in- 
stant. 

"I  will  get  Miss  Grey  to  bewail  something 
being  '  So  near  and  yet  so  far,'  as  loud  as  she 
can — she  will  do  anything  I  ask  her — then  I 
will  hear  what  you  have  to  tell  me,  Florry." 

The  girl's  eyes  followed  him  as  he  walked 
away  to  the  other  side  of  the  room,  where  sat 
Miss  Grey,  expectant. 

"I  hope  he  won't  say  that  Stanley  is  foolish, 
or  make  hard-hearted  speeches,  and  seem  to 
look  down  upon  the  affair  altogether."  Then 
she  watched  him  wistfully  while  he  bent  over 
and  solicited  Miss  Grey  for  her  song — watched 
him  wistfully,  to  her  mamma's  intense  chagrin. 

Not  that  the  man  was  a  "detrimental,"  ac- 
cording to  the  usual  acceptation  of  the  term,  or 
that  Lady  Yillars  was  a  heartless,  manoeuvring 


parent ;  on  the  contrary,  Claude  Walsingham, 
major  in  a  light  cavalry  regiment,  and  eldest 
son  of  a  good  old  west  country  house,  was  a 
prize  that  had  been  deemed  worth  striving  after. 
in  all  honour,  by  the  many,  for  some  three  or 
four  seasons. 

Still,  a  mother — a  widowed  mother — with 
two  fair  daughters  on  hand,  was  justified  in 
watching  keenly  and  feeling  anxious — as  Lady 
Yillars  did  watch  and  feel  whenever  Major 
Walsingham  and  Florry  held  confidential  con- 
verse. For  Claude  had  been  in  severe  action 
with  the  other  sex  before  now,  and  had  inva- 
riably come  out  scatheless.  Lady  Yillars  knew 
that  when  the  action  is  severe  one  of  the  con- 
tending parties  must  of  necessity  be  wounded. 
Therefore  she  now  watched  Florence's  fixed  re- 
gard of  Claude's  movements  with  an  anxious 
eye  and  a  perturbed  spirit.  But  for  all  that  her 
mien  was  calm  and  her  smile  unwavering ;  for 
she  was  a  woman  of  the  world,  with  her 
daughter's  future  dependent  on  her  in  a  great 
measure. 

He  was  a  worthy  subject  of  the  fixed  regard 
Florence  bestowed  upon  him,  from  the  artistic 
point  of  view,  for  he  was  one  of  Nature's  finest 
works — a  handsome  young  Englishman,  with 
all  the  best  points  of  breeding  and  birth  clearly 
distinguishable  about  him. 

Stern  physiognomists  might  have  objected  to 
a  scanty  development  of  temple  and  fulness  of 
under-lip.  Neither  mouth  nor  forehead  were 
deficient  in  beauty,  however ;  so  but  few  women 
thought  for  an  instant  of  the  possibly  absent 
intellect,  or  probably  present  sensuousness — 
sensuality  would  be  too  strong  a  word  to  use 
about  a  man  whose  gay,  glancing  career  had 
been  unmarked  by  anything  positively  staining 
yet. 

At  any  rate,  Florence  Yillars  had  never  given 
a  thought  to  the  possible  existence  of  anything 
that  could  be  considered  dimming  to  the  bright- 
ness of  a  character  which  she  had  elected  for 
some  time  to  firmly  believe  corresponded  in  all 
things  to  the  man's  glittering  exterior.  She 
had  fixed  her  young  faith  upon  him — adorned 
him  with  all  the  good  traits  and  noble  qualities 
a  man  such  as  he  seemed  should  have.  In 
short,  she  had  given  her  heart  to  the  young, 
good-looking  light  cavalry  officer,  and  so  her 
imagination  had  enriched  him  with  all  the  at- 
tributes of  a  hero. 

Despite  that  before-mentioned  narrowness  of 
brow  and  fulness  of  under-lip  which  might  pos- 
sibly betoken  attributes  the  reverse  of  heroic, 
he  was  precisely  the  style  of  man  whom  girls 
delight  in  placing  upon  a  pedestal  The  stumpy, 
stout  man  may  have  the  better  heart  and  the 
broader  mind ;  but  the  stumpy  stoutness  blinds 
the  eyes  of  very  young  womanLood  to  his 
worthy  merits.  The  proportions  of  a  god  (as 
gods  are  proportioned  in  marble),  and  the  air  of 
a  man  of  fashion,  are  things  that  appeal  far  more 
strongly  to  the  taste,  the  heart,  and  eyes  of  the 
majority  of  girls  under  twenty. 

Claude  Walsingham  was  tall  and  lithe — lithe 
in  a  wiry,  not  a  weakly  way.  There  was  vast 
strength  in  his  slight  undulating  form,  and  his 
small,  white,  delicate  hands  were  of  iron,  as 
more  than  one  hard-mouthed  horse  could  testify 
to  its  sorrow.  He  never  struck  you  as  being  a  \ 
muscular,  nowerful  man;  his  appearance,  his  i 


ON  GUARD. 


supple  sliglitness,  was  as  deceptive  as  was  his 
cold,  unemotional  manner. 

Add  to  this  supple,  slender  frame  a  pale,  fair, 
clean-cut  face,  the  chief  features  of  which  were 
au  aquiline  nose  and  a  pair  of  cold  blue  eyes 
spotted  with  reddish  brown ;  hair  of  the  latter 
hue,  closely  cropped,  with  whiskers  and  mous- 
tache of  a  lighter  colour,  but  otherwise  strongly 
resembling  Lord  Dundreary's,  and  the  portrait 
of  Claude  Walsingham  is  before  you. 

"Now  for  your  great  news,  Florry,"  he  said, 
lounging  up  to  Florence  when  he  had  planted 
Miss  Grey  at  the  piano,  disappointing  the  latter, 
truth  to  tell,  most  cruelly  by  leaving  her  to  turn 
over  her  own  leaves.  "Now  for  your  great 
news,  Florry ;  is  it  that  you  are  going  to  be 
married?" 

She  blushed,  not  with  confusion,  but  with 
pure  annoyance— annoyance  that  robbed  her 
sweet  face  of  its  smile  for  a  minute  or  two,  and 
rendered  her  incapable  of  speech.  During  the 
pause  she  made  perforce,  he  watched  her  with 
an  admiring  gaze  and  a  well-pleased  smile ;  but 
Florry  marked  neither  the  one  nor  the  other  by 
reason  of  her  head  being  bent  down. 

"  My  great  news  relates  to  Stanley,  not  to 
myself  at  all,  Major  Walsingham,"  she  said,  in 
a  low  tone,  presently. 

"Why  'Major  Walsmgham ?'  No,  Florry, 
not  another  word  even  about  dear  old  Stanley 
till  you  have  told  me  what  Claude  has  done  to 
merit  such  painful  promotion." 

"I  can't  endure  to  have  such  absurd  sugges- 
tions made  to  me,  by  you  of  all  people." 

"Florry,  I  mention  such  a  possibility  in  sheer 
idleness,  as  I  should  speak  of  jumping  over  a 
precipice  or  cutting  my  own  throat — one  would 
be  equally  destructive  to  me  as  the  other." 

The  girl  looked  shyly  up  at  him,  blushing 
hotly ;  but  no  longer  with  annoyance. 

"Claude!— ah!  what  was  I  saying?  Oh! 
about  Stanley— I  know  now;  he  is  going— 
what  should  you  think  Stanley  is  going  to 

"  Cut  the  Church,  I  hope." 

"  No,  Claude,  no ;  I  won't  have  you  speak  in 
such  a  way  of  Stanley's  profession ;  he  is  going 
to  do  a  much  better  thing— marry  Bella  Vane." 

"No!" 

"Yes,  I  tell  you:  and  why  not — isn't  it 
charming?  Do  you  know  her?" 

"Never  saw  her." 

"Why  did  you  look  aghast  and  say  'No'  in 
that  way  when  I  said  Stanley  was  going  to 
marry  Bella  Vane?" 

"I  should  have  looked  and  said  just  the 
same  if  you  had  told  me  Stanley  was  going  to 
marry  Bella  anybody  else.  I  wish  some  one 
would  make  day  hideous  with  her  shrieks.  I 
want  to  hear  a  full  account  of  Stanley's  insan- 
ity, and  your  mother's  telegraphing  you  to 
leave  me  to  my  own  miserable  devices.  Who 
is  Bella  Vane?" 

"  A  sweet  girl " 

"That  of  course  all  girls  are.  She  isn't 
Stanley's  rector's  daughter,  is  she  ?" 

"  No ;  she  is  that  Mr.  Vane's  niece.  Surely 
you  saw  her  last  year  ?  She  was  up  for  a  time 
with  the  Leicesters.  Mr.  Leicester  is  another 
uncle.  Stanley  met  her  there,  and  she  was 
here  once  or  twice.  I  suppose  he  fell  in  love 
with  her  then,  for  the  announcement  of  the 


engagement  followed  close  upon  that  of  her 
having  arrived  at  Denham  on  a  visit  We  are 
all  delighted." 

"  I  am  not  delighted." 

"  Yet  you  pretend  to  be  fond  of  Stanley 
Claude." 

"  It  Was  a  terrible  blow  to  my  affection  when 
Stanley  went  into  that  perpetual  curacy ;  this 
further  rush  into  perpetual  poverty  is  reallv  too 
harrowing." 

"  But  it  won't  be  poverty— I  forgot  to  say 
that  she  is  an  heiress,"  Florry  cried  hurriedly. 
She  was  distressed  at  the  disapproval  Claude 
was  manifesting  about  his  friend  her  brother's 
new  and  important  move  on  the  board  of  life. 

"That  alters  the  case  materially  •  I  am  be- 
ginning to  be  delighted  too." 

"How  calculating  you  are,  Claude,"  she 
said,  sorrowfully. 

"I  think  my  bitterest  foe  would  tell  you  that 
I  am  so  solely  for  my  friends,  Florry.  I  own  I 
am  glad  that  Stanley  has  secured  money,  for  I 
should  not  have  liked  the  woman  who  had 
dragged  him  into  obscurity." 

"  Why  would  it  have  been  '  obscurity,'  even 
if  Bella  had  had  no  money  ?  You  can  live  on, 
oh !  ever  so  little,  quite  nicely  in  the  country, 
you  know.  Besides,  Stanley  is  sure  to  rise — it 
isn't  a  perpetual  curacy,  and  he  will  leave  it 
by-and-by  for  a  living,  I  hope." 

"I  hope  so.  I  will  drop  him  a  line  to-night, 
congratulating  him,  on  your  authority.  Good- 
bye, Florry." 

He  pressed  her  hand  gently  as  she  gave  it 
into  his,  and  looked  lazily  over  her  head  the 
while  into  the  eyes  of  Miss  Grey,  who  was 
willing,  report  said,  to  bestow  herself  and  three 
thousand  a-year  upon  the  light  dragoon. 

"You  will  be  there  to-night.     Good-bye," 
she  replied,  hastily. 
"There!    Where?" 

"At  Gerald's— Lady  Villars  quite  expects 
you." 

"  I  shall  just  look  in  and  make  my  bow ;  I 
can  do  no  more  to-night,  unhappily,  for  I  am 
going  with  a  man  at  eleven  to  sup  with  several 
Bohemians." 

She  looked  disappointed.  The  Dowager 
Lady  Villars  never  took  her  daughters  to  a  ball 
till  eleven,  therefore  the  chances  of  seeing 
Claude  at  her  sister-in-law's  ball  were  not 
great. 

"  How  have  you  travelled  into  that  country, 
Claude  ?  Who  has  been  your  guide  ?  I  thought 
you  did  not  know  and  could  not  bear  Bohe- 
mians." 

"  Have  you  a  clear  notion  of  what  Bohe- 
mians are  ?"  he  asked,  laughingly. 

"No,"  she  said  frankly,  she  had  not;  she 
used  the  phrase  as  she  used  many  another  one, 
without  any  very  definite  idea  as  to  what  it 
applied. 

"  It  is  not  a  practicable  thing  to  steer  clear  of 
them,  Florry;  they're  everywhere — Church, 
army,  physic,  law,  all  assist  in  swelling  the 
list." 

'  Then  you  simply  mean  that  you  are  going 
to-night  to  a  mixed  party?" 
He  laughed,  "  Very  mixed." 
"I  thought  Bohemians  were    people  who 
sang  and  acted,  and  wrote  for  all  sorts  of  papers 
and  journals,  Claude." 


8 


ON  GUAIiD. 


"You  did  not  think  far  wrong." 

""Well,  I  thought "    She  paused  for  a 

few  moments,  until  he  asked  her  what  else  she 
thought 

"  Why,  that  you  were  rather  too  fine  to  know 
such  men." 

"  The  men  are  cads,"  he  said  thoughtfully. 

"  Still,  you  will  give  up  Carrie's  ball  for  the 
sake  of  going  amongst  them ;  now,  Claude,  I 
call  that  inconsistent." 

"  Don't  attempt  to  prove  anything,  Florry ; 
you're  not  a  bit  of  a  casuist  fortunately.  I  am 
going  to-night  to  hear  a — a  fellow  with  a  won- 
derful voice — sweetest  soprano  I  ever " 

" '  Fellows '  don't  have  soprano  voices, 
Claude,"  she  said  quickly :  "  you  must  mean  a 
tenor." 

"I  do — of  course  I  do — mean  a  tenor,"  he 
replied,  colouring  slightly.  Then  he  held  his 
hand  out  a  second  time,  and  took  hers  in  fare- 
well; which  proceeding,  in  conjunction  with 
the  long  private  conversation  with  Florry,  and 
certain  rumours  she  had  heard  respecting  him, 
caused  Lady  Villars  no  small  anxiety. 

Florence  drifted  aimlessly  about  the  room 
after  his  departure,  and  strove  to  amuse  and  be 
amused  by  the  other  guests,  until  such  time  as 
they,  too,  in  mercy  vanished.  But  there  was 
little  heart  in  her  striving,  and  so  it  failed  in  its 
object,  which  failure  was  marked  by  Lady  Vil- 
lars, and  her  eldest  daughter,  Georgina. 

"Florry  dear,"  Miss  Villars  said  to  her  sister 
a  little  later,  when,  ensconced  in  their  mutual 
dressing-room,  they  were  resting,  previous  to 
dressing  for  the  ball,  "  mamma  wishes  that  you 
wouldn't  let  Claude  devote  himself  quite  so  ex- 
clusively to  you ;  there  are  things  said  about 
him  that  mamma  does  not  like." 

"  Who  tells  them  to  her,  Georgie  ?" 

"Mr.  Manners  amongst  others,  and  he 
wouldn't  malign  any  one,  you  know." 

"  Ah !  he  is  such  a  different  man.  He  may 
judge  Claude  harshly,  Georgie ;  I  can't  believe 
anything  true  of  Claude  that  is  not  good,"  Flo- 
rence pleaded  rather  wistfully. 

"  True  or  not,  they  are  currently  reported,  so 
you  must  be  careful,  darling,"  Georgina  cried, 
blithely.  She  herself  was  engaged  firmly  and 
securely  to  the  worthiest  of  men,  about  whom 
none  but  good  words  had  ever  been  said.  It 
seemed  to  her  but  a  little  thing  to  discounte- 
nance a  handsome  scapegrace  of  whom  "  mam- 
ma had  heard  things."  She  did  not,  in  her  own 
well-assured  happiness,  give  a  thought  to  the 
possible  cause  of  the  languid  indifference  with 
which  Florry  went  through  the  business  of  the 
ball  that  night,  after  Claude  had  passed  along 
in  front  of  Lady  Villars,  in  acknowledgment  of 
her  courtesy  in  inviting  him. 

It  was  all  weariness  and  vexation  of  spirit  to 
Florry  from  the  moment  Claude's  close -cropped 
fair  head  was  finally  borne  from  the  room. 


CHAPTER  II. 

A  GREAT  BEAUTY. 

THE  first  scene  opened  on  a  somnorific,  sultry 
summer  afternoon  in  London.  The  curtain  is 
lifted  now  upon  a  widely  different  one.  The 


time  is  morning,  the  morning  after  that  kettle- 
drum at  Lady  Villars'.  But  the  place  is  the 
shady  low-roofed  drawing-room  of  a  secluded 
old  rectory — a  dear  old  sequestered  house,  with 
whitewashed  walls,  over  which  roses  crept  and 
jasmines  wandered,  and  above  which  rooks  caw- 
ed daily  in  a  way  that  proved  how  entirely  at 
home  they  were — and  in  which,  truth  to  tell, 
dulness  very  often  dwelt. 

Dulness  did  not  dwell  there  at  this  precise 
period,  however;  for  bright  Bella  Vane  was 
there  on  a  visit  to  her  uncle  and  aunt.  The 
whole  house,  the  whole  village,  was  redolent  of 
her,  so  to  say.  She  was  there  in  the  full  glow 
of  her  beauty  and  wealth — there  with  the  ear- 
liest bloom  of  a  happiness  that  was  new  to  her. 

In  her  character  of  beauty  and  heiress,  she 
had  always  been  an  interesting  study,  a  never- 
failing  subject  of  inquiry  and  interest,  to  her 
uncle's  parish  and  the  neighbourhood  around. 
Now  the  interest  was  deepened,  for  she  had 
come  amongst  them  but  the  other  day  free,  and 
now  she  was  fettered — fettered  to  no  less  a  per- 
son than  the  clerical  favourite  of  the  locality, 
Mr.  Stanley  Villars,  Mr.  Vane's  curate. 

Bella  Vane  was  what  Florence  Villars,  in 
the  enthusiasm  of  the  moment  for  her  pet 
brother's  betrothed,  had  called  her,  "  charming." 
She  was  thoroughly  "  charming,"  though  it 
would  be  difficult  to  say  precisely  why  she  was 
so.  About  her  beauty  there  could  be  no  mis- 
take ;  no  difference  of  opinion  even.  She  was 
not  one  of  those  of  whom  keen-eyed  critics  can 
say,  "  Yes,  she's  lovely,  only  rather  too  " — 
this,  that,  and  the  other.  She  was  lovely,  and 
there  could  in  truth  be  no  "only  "  or  "  but " 
raised  as  to  the  fact  of  her  being  so.  Her  figure 
was  lovely,  tall,  and  slight,  yet,  withal,  well 
rounded.  Her  head,  crowned  with  its  dark 
masses  of  shining  long  hair,  was  shaped  like 
one  of  Phidias'  realised  dreams  of  "  fair  women." 
Her  oval  face  was  perfect  in  the  delicacy  and 
exquisite  proportion  of  its  classical  lines.  And, 
in  addition  to  this  rare,  this  almost  antique  per- 
fection of  form,  Bella  Vane  had  expression  too. 

Such  expression !  Take  your  most  glowing 
conception  of  Cleopatra,  and  refine  ifc,  and  you 
may  come  near  to  having  some  notion  of  the 
warmth  and  force  that  dwelt  in  Bella's  wonder- 
ful steel-blue  eyes,  and  on  her  full,  short,  ruddy 
lips — lip  I  should  say,  rather,  for  the  under  one 
was  not  full.  There  was  nothing  coarse  in  her 
physique ;  it  was  the  fair  presentment  of  her 
mind.  Nothing  could  exceed,  few  things  could 
equal,  the  delicacy  of  her  mouth  and  chin.  The 
short,  curled,  ruddy  upper  lip,  so  quick  to 
quiver,  so  prompt  to  thrill,  showed  that  she 
could  feel.  The  chin,  the  firm,  cleanly-cut, 
delicately-rounded  chin,  that  did  not  retreat, 
after  the  fashion  of  gentle  Florry  Villars',  show- 
ed that  she  could  think.  But  it  was  the  square 
forehead,  from  which  the  hair  was  turned  back 
entirely,  and  suffered  to  hang  in  loose  curls  be- 
hind, that  told  you  in  unmistakable  language 
that  the  great  beauty  was  likewise  a  clever  girl. 

It  has  been  said  that  she  was  a  great  heiress. 
That  she  was  such,  had  been  impressed  upon 
her  understanding  from  the  time  she  could 
understand  anything;  for  she  was  the  only 
child  of  an  uncommonly  unreserved  mother, 
who  was  a  widow.  Those  surrounding  Bella 
had  not  omitted  the  information  that  she  was  a 


ON  GUARD. 


great  beauty  also ;  nor  had  they  neglected  to 
inculcate  the  desirability  of  her  having  very 
great  claims  socially  and  matrimonially.  They 
taught  her  these  things  to  the  best  of  their 
ability,  and  they  taught  her  little  else. 

The  girl  had  had  governesses  and  masters 
whose  name  was  legion,  but  she  had  learnt  little 
from  them.  She  was  idle  and  impulsive  in 
childhood  and  very  early  girlhood,  and  the  idle- 
ness made  her  neglect  to  learn,  and  the  impul- 
siveness caused  her  to  quarrel  with  her  instruc- 
tors when  they  attempted  to  insist  upon  her 
doing  so  The  result  was,  that  she  grew  up 
undisciplined  and  imperfectly  educated — with  a 
superficial  knowledge  of  many  things,  and  a 
profound  belief  in  her  own  right  to  sway. 

But  though  thus  indifferently  cultivated,  she 
was  a  clever  girl — quick  to  catch  up  the  salient 
points  of  a  subject — specially  gifted  with  the 
dangerous  art  of  "  seeming  to  know  all  about 
it."  She  had  wearied  of  all  the  things  they 
strove  to  teach  her  whilst  they  had  been  so 
striving ;  but  when  she  grew  up,  and  was  free 
to  follow  her  own  sweet  will,  she  turned  of  her 
own  accord  to  several  of  the  neglected  accom- 
plishments, and  mastered  them. 

She  turned  to  them  with  understanding  arid 
love,  surmounting  all  the  inseparable  difficulties 
in  a  very  different  way  to  that  which  she  would 
have  done  had  she  been  driven  to  surmount 
them.  The  regulation  drawing  and  singing 
lessons  had  been  odious  to  her.  But  she  took 
the  best  she  could  procure,  with  industrious 
avidity.,  after  her  first  tour  on  the  Continent — 
her  first  experience  of  the  art-galleries  of  Italy 
and  Germany. 

Her  reasons  for  surmounting  difficulties  were 
not  invariably  so  lofty  as  were  those  which  in- 
duced her  to  strive  to  give  herself,  with  her 
own  hand,  the  sensations  of  delight  colour  and 
form,  from  the  pencils  of  others,  had  imparted  to 
her.  For  instance,  it  was  less  a  desire  to  enjoy 
Schiller  and  Goethe  in  the  original  than  to 
please  Stanley  Villars,  which  had  made  her  so 
assiduously  study  German  for  the  last  six 
months.  He  had  told  her  "  what  she  lost  by 
reading  them  in  English ;"  and  forthwith  Bella, 
who  had  hitherto  denounced  German  as  a  cross 
between  "snarl  and  sore  throat,"  found  that 
language  full  and  soft,  mellow  and  expressive, 
beyond  every  other. 

Miss  Bella  had  not  been  wont  to  trouble  the 
quiet  people  at  Denham  Rectory  with  her  pre- 
sence very  often,  before  the  man  who  had  re- 
commended Schiller  and  Goethe  in  the  original, 
became  her  uncle's  curate.  After  that  event 
she  inflicted  her  charming  presence  upon  them 
frequently — and  now  she  was  settled  there  for  a 
few  weeks,  at  the  least,  for  she  was  Stanley 
Villars'  affianced  bride. 

I  say  "troubled  them  with  her  presence"  and 
"  inflicted  it  upon  them  "  advisedly,  for  it  is  a 
fact  that  a  beauty  and  heiress  in  a  quiet  hum- 
drum household  is  a  great  bore  almost  invaria- 
bly. Mr.  Vane  strove  hard  to  obey  her  behest 
"  not  to  put  himself  out  for  her."  But  he  could 
not  succeed  in  retaining  the  blessed  calm  that 
was  his  when  she  was  not  there.  As  for  Mrs. 
Vane  she  had  been  duly  impressed  by  Bella's 
importance  in  the  latter's  infancy,  and  had 
never  been  able  to  get  rid  of,  or  conceal,  the 
feeling.  Bella,  alone,  would  have  been  all 


very  well-  for  a  time,  despite  this  wholesome 
awe  which  she  had  unwittingly  inspired  in 
their  breasts.  But  Bella's  steeds  in  their  stables, 
and  Bella's  maid  and  own  man  in  their  house, 
were  overpowering. 

Miss  Bella  never  went  anywhere  without  a 
couple  of  saddle-horses  and  these  two  personal 
attendants.  Ordinarily  this  retinue  of  hers  was 
but  a  drop  in,  the  ocean  of  life  in  the  mansions 
of  the  great  with  whom  she  sojourned.  But 
this  Denham  Rectory  was  an  exceptional  place ; 
accommodation  was  limited  therein.  There 
was  a  feeling  of  oppression  over  all  the  resi- 
dents, and  a  pervading  sensation  of  tightness 
during  the  whole  time  Miss  Vane  remained 
with  them. 

She  was  happily  unconscious  of  what  a  great 
bore  she  was — this  great  beauty,  who  was  gene- 
rally so  prompt  to  see  and  feel.  She  thought 
that  it  was  their  normal  condition  to  be  con- 
strained in  manner  and  uncomfortable  in  mind 
— to  be  dull,  and  decorously  depressed,  and  ad- 
dicted to  habits  of  silence.  That  they  were  so 
in  her  presence  afforded  her  no  manner  of  un- 
easiness, not  one  pang  of  the  gentlest  regret. 
It  pleased  her  to  stay  with  them  now  on  account 
of  Stanley  Villars.  Whether  it  pleased  them 
to  have  her  was  a  matter  of  minor  importance 
to  the  great  beauty,  who  was  just  a  little  selfish. 

Miss  Vane's  engagement  was  still  a  very 
young  thing :  so  young  a  thing  that  she  treated 
it  still  with  the  sweetest  consideration,  remain- 
ing here  in  the  quiet  country  to  enjoy  it  simply 
and  thoroughly.  How  it  had  come  about  shall 
be  told  presently,  together  with  Miss  Vane's 
reasons  for  feeling  astonished  that  it  should 
have  come  about  at  all. 

For  three  weeks  she  had  been  here  at  Den- 
ham, taking  long  rides  in  the  morning,  on  her 
brown  mare  Vengeance,  accompanied  by  her 
"own  man"  and  her  big  setter  Rock;  dressing 
elaborately  for  the  five  o'clock  dinner,  and  then 
wandering  about  the  rectory  grounds  all  the 
evening  with  Stanley  Villars. 

For  a  fortnight  these  wanderings  had  been 
enlivened  by  a  certain  doubt,  uncertainty,  and 
tremulousness  of  spirit.  She  felt  persuaded 
that  he  loved  her ; — she  was  a  thorough  woman  ; 
she  never  remained  oblivious  of  a  pleasing  fact 
a  minute  after  it  became  one  ; — but  she  was  by 
no  means  certain  that  he  would  tell  her  so.  He 
was  a  cool,  thoughtful,  earnest  man.  Bella 
could  see  that  he  himself  felt  that  there  was  a 
want  of  wisdom  in  his  love  for  her,  the  impas- 
sioned, wilful  beauty.  So  for  a  fortnight  the 
young  lady,  who  had  never  been  baffled  in  one 
of  her  smallest  desires  up  to  the  present  time, 
doubted  whether  or  not  he  would  suffer  love  to 
be  the  lord  of  all. 

He  knew  that  there  was  a  want  of  wisdom 
in  this  love  of  his,  but  battling  against  it  was 
of  no  avail ;  the  girl  was  with  him  too  often  for 
Prudence  to  retain  her  empire  in  his  soul.  The 
girl  was  with  him  too  often,  for  the  village  was 
very  small,  society  very  limited  therein,  and 
Mrs.  Vane  was  driven  to  lay  forcible  hands 
upon  any  one  who  could  assist  in  entertaining 
her  oppressive  niece.  She  was  with  him  fre- 
quently, listening  to  his  words  as  though  they 
were  passing  sweet  to  her ;  sparing  no  looks, 
no  lure,  no  tone  that  might  still  further  win  him  ; 
flattering  him  with  the  terrible  intensity  of 


10 


ON  GUARD. 


that  flattery  which  only  a  woman  who  believes 
that  her  spurious  enthusiasm,  her  sham  senti- 
ment, and  her  evanescent  affection  are  real, 
true,  and  lasting,  can  employ. 

Her  belief  in  herself  created  in  very  undue 
time  a  corresponding  one  in  him.  He  soon 
came  to  deem  the  girl  all  that  she  seemed — all 
that  he  could  wish  her  to  be.  Beauty,  heiress, 
spoilt  child,  wilful  woman  as  she  was,  he  yet 
told  himself  that  she  was  just  such  a  help  as 
would  be  meet  for  him.  She  was  a  petted  dar- 
ling in  the  giddiest  circles.  He  was  a  country 
clergyman,  with  no  particular  prospects  of  pro- 
motion in  the  profession  that,  for  its  own  sake, 
was  dear  to  his  heart.  "What  objections  could 
be  raised  to  a  union,  or  a  contemplated  union, 
between  these  two  ?  None ;  not  one  that  could 
stand  for  a  moment  against  that  resistless  charm 
of  hers ;  not  one  that  his  manly  faith  in  what 
was  so  passing  fair  did  not  attribute  to  mere 
worldly  distrust  and  an  unreliant  heart. 

It  was  but  for  a  fortnight,  but  for  fourteen 
days,  that  he  rode  Faith  with  a  curb,  and  kept 
steady  hand  on  Desire."  At  the  end  of  that 
time  it  came  to  him  to  feel  that  to  win  in  the 
race  of  life  he  must  wait  upon  circumspection 
and  self-denial  no  longer.  Then  he  called  upon 
his  reliance  on  What  is  to  be,  is  best ;  and  the 
call  was  answered.  He  came  in  winner — he 
little  knew  how  little  ahead — of  the  hand  and 
heart  of  Bella  Vane. 

I  like  the  girl  whom  I  have  created,  or  rather 
I  like  the  prototype  from  whom  I  have  drawn 
her,  so  well,  that  I  fear  there  will  be  pain  in 
telling  how  little  worthy  she  was  of  this  battle 
in  his  heart — this  victory,  which  may  turn  out 
a  defeat,  which  he  had  gained.  I  like  her  for 
her  deep  steel-blue  eyes,  and  her  warm,  loving 
smile,  and  the  winsome  charm  that  was  diffused 
through  all  her  being  and  her  bearing.  "  What 
moral  is  in  being  fair  ?"  This :  that  all  to  whom 
that  which  is  truth  embodied  beauty  itself,  is 
dear,  love  it,  sympathise  with  its  failings,  and 
screen  its  frailties. 

She  had  shown  neither  failing  in  aught  that 
might  be  expected  of  her,  nor  frailty  of  purpose, 
as  yet,  this  fair  young  creature.  She  had  broken 
no  troth,  blighted  no  being,  betrayed  no  trust. 
But  for  all  this  internal  integrity,  she  was  not 
quite  at  peace  with  herself  on  this  summer 
morning  when  I  show  her  to  you  first. 

She  was  sitting  alone,  quite  alone,  in  the 
quaint  old  drawing-room  of  the  quainter  old 
house,  on  this  sultry  June  morning.  She  was 
bereft  of  her  usual  morning  amusements.  It 
had  been  too  hot  to  take  Vengeance  for  a  good, 
hard,  exhilarating  trot.  Stanley  was  in  the 
parish.  She  detested  needlework,  unless  she 
had  some  one  by  to  assort  her  skeins  and  talk 
to  her.  All  these  things  were  hard  to  bear,  but 
harder  still  was  the  fact  that  she  had  no  new 
books  and  no  morning  papers  to  read. 

Any  one  who  has  been  accustomed  to  a  full 
supply  of  them  for  years  can  understand  the 
sudden  blank,  the  awful  misery  of  falling  short, 
or  straying  away  out  of  the  bounds  of  delivery, 
of  those  yellow-ticketed  volumes  which  go  to 
the  making  up  of  a  considerable  portion  of 
nineteenth-century  bliss.  Bella  was  wont  to 
have  her  interest  kept  on  the  gui  vive  for  four 
heroines  and  as  many  heroes  at  one  time  in 
divers  serials.  In  addition  to  this  long-dra.wn- 


out  excitement  she  was  accustomed  to  "  look 
1  over"  all  that  everybody  was  doing  in  Central 
Africa,  "the  House, •'  hebdomadal  and  daily 
literature,  and  fashionable  life.  Now  at  one  fell 
blow  she  was  cut  off  from  daily  intercourse 
with  the  library,  morning  papers,  and  the  people 
of  her  own  set.  In  default  of  these  she  had 
fresh  air  and  Stanley  Villars.  But  she  had 
been  in  the  country  for  three  weeks ;  had  been 
engaged  to  the  aforesaid  seven  days ;  and  was 
— Bella  Vane. 

"  Ah,  well,  the  women  free  from  faults  have 
beds  below  the  willow."  I  am  never  tired  of 
that  quotation.  To  me  it  has  as  deep  a  mean- 
ing, is  as  fraught  with  pathos  and  plea  and 
profound  pity  for  the  weak  and  wavering,  as 
was  "vanity  of  vanities,  all  is  vanity,"  to  the 
great  preacher,  and  his  great  exponent  in  these 
our  own  days.  Bella  Vane  was  very  far  from 
faultless.  She  had  not  yet  graduated  for  a 
"  bed  beneath  the  willow."  She  sat  here  in  the 
June  sunbeams  twisting  the  week-old  engage- 
ment-ring upon  her  finger,  and  wishing,  with  all 
the  power  of  wishing  within  her,  that  Stanley 
could  give  up  more  time  to  her — that  the  beauti- 
ful country  was  not  so  dull — and  that  she  had 
not  promised  her  mamma  to  remain  quiescent 
in  it  for  still  a  month  longer,  in  order  to  regain 
her  roses,  which  a  brisk  early  season  in  London 
had  slightly  faded. 

She  had  arranged  herself  on  a  bay  window, 
with  her  feet  on  the  sill  of  the  same,  and  a  two- 
days-old  Morning  Post  in  her  lap.  Its  being 
two  days  old  was  no  drawback  to  the  delight 
with  which  she  perused  it.  Politics  did  not 
interest  her  one  whit.  Whether  the  North 
swamped  the  South — Denmark  got  its  duchies — 
the  duchies  their  independence — or  the  grandest 
armies  were  decimated  for  an  idea — was  of  little 
moment  to  Bella.  Such  things  had  their  impor- 
tance and  value  she  did  not  doubt,  but  they 
never  came  in  her  way.  Had  the  men  she 
knew  been  connected  ever  so  remotely  with 
the  state,  it  would  have  been  different.  As  it 
was,  the  sole  diplomatist  who  had  bowed  at  her 
shrine  was  a  young  unpaid  attacfte  to  the  em- 
bassy at  a  minute  court.  He  having  spelt  pro- 
vidence with  a  "&"  hi  his  solitary  effusion  to 
her,  was  regarded  by  her  but  lightly. 

What  made  the  Morning  Post  acceptable  to 
her,  whether  it  was  old  or  young,  was  its  full 
description  of  the  Princess's  last  new  ball-dress, 
and  the  list  of  names  of  those  who  saw  the 
Princess  wear  the  same.  Miss  Bella  had  run 
the  gauntlet  of  but  one  London  season,  and  if 
she  had  not  striven  to  enchain  a  duke,  would 
have  won  an  earl — so  everybody  said.  But 
she  had  striven  to  enchain  a  duke,  and  the  duke 
has  successfully  wrestled  against  a  fairer  fate 
than  may  ever  be  offered  him  again.  Now 
that  he  was  pledged  to  a  very  different  line  of 
life,  she  remembered  the  scenes  in  which  she 
had  so  striven :  the  duke's  name  amongst  those 
of  others  in  the  columns  of  the  paper  recalled 
those  scenes  vividly.  The  remembrance  made 
her  sad — she  knew  not  why;  only  a  country 
village  was  dull,  and  she  was  a  spoilt  beauty, 
and  very  young. 

I  like  the  girl  whom  I  have  created.    Are  we 
not  all  apt  to  be  led  away  into  a  perhaps  not   \ 
too  well-founded  admiration  for  the  possessors  of 
big,  blue,  earnest  eyes,  and  finely-curved,  ex- 


ON  GUARD. 


11 


pressive  lips  ?  Beauty  has  a  blinding  influence ; 
we  cannot  see  its  faults  yet  awhile — "just  a 
little  longer,"  we  are  always  pleading,  to  be 
lieve  it  as  perfect  as  it  seems. 

I  like  this  girl — yet  I  do  not  declare  that  her 
speedy  wearying  of  love's  young  dream  was 
right  or  amiable.  She — the  betrothed  bride  of 
a  w£ek — ought  not  to  have  sighed  over  the 
columns  of  the  Morning  Post.  Nor  was  it  good 
of  her  to  debate  seriously  within  herself  the 
question  of  whether  she  should  break  her  reso 
lution,  order  her  mamma  suddenly  back  to 
town,  and  go  to  a  grand  fete  at  a  villa  on  the 
banks  of  the  Thames,  which  she  saw  announced, 
and  to  which,  of  course,  she  would  be  invited ; 
and  so  break  up  the  course  of  evening  wander- 
ings which  she  had  been  taking  with  Stanley 
Villars. 

"I  am  happier  here  with  Stanley,  naturally," 
she  said  to  herself,  after  a  long  perusal  of  the 
paper,  and  a  longer  cogitation  over  its  contents. 
Then  she  took  out  her  watch  to  see  what  time 
it  was,  and  yawned  wearily  when  she  found 
that  still  another  hour  remained  to  be  passed 
away  before  the  luncheon  bell  would  ring. 
"  What  on  earth  can  Aunt  Yane  be  about  ?  I'm 
sick  of  it  all  1" 

She  had  been  alone  all  the  morning,  and  she 
was  a  social  creature,  who  loved  to  hear  the 
sound  of  her  own  and  others'  voices.  Neither 
the  feeling  nor  the  expression  were  very  extra- 
ordinary under  the  circumstances.  Still  she 
wished  that  she  could  have  retracted  both,  for 
she  remembered  that  the  man  she  had  promised 
to  marry  had  a  prominent  place  in  the  scenes 
'  of  which  she  was  sick. 

She  was  just  resolving  to  eschew  all  mid-day 
sustenance,  and  go  out  for  a  couple  of  hours  on 
Vengeance,  when  she  heard  a  step  on  the  gravel 
outside  the  window — a  step  that  was  familiar 
to  her — a  step  that,  despite  this  sudden  acces- 
sion of  petulant  weariness,  was  very  dear  to 
her.  All  traces  of  discontentment  and  dulness 
vanished  from  her  face  as  she  rose  up  quickly 
and  stepped  between  the  screening  roses  that 
fell  over  the  window.  She  forgot  the  fete  by 
the  river,  the  triumphs  of  last  year,  and  the 
possible  chagrin  of  the  duke  at  having  lost  her, 
as  she  came  out  into  the  presence  of  the  man 
who  had  won  her. 

"  Stanley,  I  am  so  glad  you  are  come,"  she 
began,  impetuously ;  "  I  have  had  nothing  to 
do,  and  no  one  to  speak  to  all  the  morning." 
Then  she  went  on  to  tell  him  of  the  half-formed 
determination  to  go  away  for  a  few  days,  and 
he  listened  to  it  silently — never  combating  it 
by  any  of  the  loving  words  she  had  hoped  he 
would  use. 

He  has  been  called  the  pet  brother  of  the  girl 
whose  beauty  was  of  the  soft  and  yielding 
order — fit  robe  of  her  mind.  The  pet  brothers 
of  soft  and  yielding  sisters  are  almost  sure  to 
possess  the  opposite  qualities  in  the  extreme. 
Stanley  Villars  was  not  a  hard  man,  nor  an 
obstinate  one ;  but  he  was  not  readily  impress- 
ed, and  even  Florry  said  that  he  could  be  very 
firm. 

Look  at  him  as  he  stands  now  with  Bella 
Vane  clasping  his  arm  with  both  'her  hands,  as 
she  tells  him,  half  piteously,  half  humorously, 
how  the  dulness  and  heat  of  the  day  had  all 
but  routed  her  from  the  village.  A  tall,  well- 


built  young  man,  whose  figure  graced  the  garb 
he  wore  in  a  way  that  made  full  many  a  woman 
sigh  that  some  more  graceful  garb  did  not 
adorn  it.  A  man  whose  face  was  perfect  in  the 
correct  cutting  of  each  feature,  and  in  a  certain 
severe  nobility  of  expression  that  is  nicer  on  a 
bronze  coin  than  in  real  life.  His  slate-colour- 
ed eyes  were  truly  the  windows  of  a  soul  in 
which  nothing  mean  could  dwell,  even  for  an 
instant ;  and  his  mouth  had  the  lofty  beauty  of 
an  Apollo's,  who  had  never  said  a  word  which 
could  shame  him  in  the  utterance.  His  head 
was  held  high,  as  were  his  thoughts  and  aspira- 
tions, and  it  was  crowned  with  dark,  curling 
locks,  that  were,  as  his  sister  Georgina  said, 
"  rather  thrown  away  on  any  one  so  superior  to 
such  things  as  Stanley."  He  wore  but  little 
whiskers,  and  no  beard  or  moustache ;  what 
whiskers  he  had  were  dark  and  silky,  and  were 
long,  after  the  fashion  of  the  day,  rather  than 
broad. 

Give  the  word  its  widest  meaning,  Stanley 
Villars  was  eminently  "  good  "-looking.  Many 
women  had  deemed  him  so,  but  few  had  ac- 
corded him  so  much  as  a  flutter  of  the  heart. 

He  had  been  struck  with  surprise  himself  when 
the  truth  came  home  to  him  that  Bella  Vane 
liked  him  well.  He  was  conscious  himself  that 
extremes  would  meet  should  they  ever  come 
together,  for  Bella  showed  her  true  colours  at 
once,  and  the  thoughtful  man  marvelled  that  so 
fiery  a  nature  should  succumb  to  his  icier  sway. 
He  watched  her  during  those  few  meetings  to 
which  Florence  had  alluded  in  London,  and  he 
marked  that  she  glowed  beneath  his  regard  as 
she  never  glowed  at  other  times.  He  watched 
her  more  keenly  still  when  she  withdrew  from 
frivolity,  acd  came  down  to  be  quiet  and  good 
in  the  country,  and  he  felt  that  the  beautiful 
girl  believed  that  not  alone  could  she  make  his 
happiness,  but  that  he  could  make  hers.  Very 
frequently  did  he  pray  that  she  might  not  be 
mistaken,  or  that  he  might  be  given  power  to 
wait  for  awhile  till  further  trial  was  given  her. 
But  she  was  with  him  frequently,  gently  show- 
ing that  she  loved  him,  sweetly  chiding  him  for 
fearing.  So  the  prudent,  Apollo-like  clergy- 
man, whom  all  women  admired,  and  so  few  had 
dared  to  love,  took  the  plunge,  and  asked  for 
the  promise  that  she  would  be  his  wife,  from 
the  great  beauty  who  might  have  been  a 
duchess. 


CHAPTER  III. 

CIRCE. 

CLAUDE  WALSINGHAM  rose  late  on  the  morning 
following  that  conversation  with  Florry  Villars, 
with  a  confused  recollection  of  having  been  be- 
trayed into  sundry  promises  under  the  influence 
of  claret-cup  champagne  and  strains  from  Ver- 
di's last  opera,  on  the  previous  night.  Not  that 
he  had  put  an  enemy  into  his  mouth  who  had 
stolen  away  all  his  wits.  He  was  a  man  of  the 
present  day ;  one  of  an  order  and  period  who 
can  go  very  wrong  indeed,  and  still  steer  clear 
of  aught  that  borders  on  excess.  But  there  are 
other  things  in  this  wicked  world  which  are 
equally  intoxicating  as  wine.  There  is  a  cer- 


12 


ON  GUARD. 


tain  incense,  compared  to  the  power  of  which, 
when  it  mounts  into  the  brain,  the  most  potent 
of  vintages  are  weak.  This  incense  had  been 
around  him  often,  but  its  enervating  odorous 
sweetness  had  never  obtained  so  full  a  domi- 
nion over  him  as  had  been  obtained  last  night. 
Every  man  must  have,  at  the  least,  an  idea 
of  what  this  incense,  to  which  no  name  can  be 
given,  since  none  can  fully  describe  it,  was 
composed.  It  is  the  atmosphere  that  women, 
who  have  charms  both  of  body  and  mind,  can 
create  around  the  man  whom,  for  reasons  noble, 
or  the  reverse  unhappily  very  often,  they  are 
desirous  to  natter  and  beguile  for  the  purpose 
of  enslaving. 

He  was  well  endowed  by  nature  and  fortune, 
as  I  have  said.  He  was  well  placed ;  and  he 
had  the  art  to  make  the  very  most  and  best  of 
his  endowments,  his  place  and  position.  This 
being  the  case,  the  legitimate  arrows  that  had 
been  discharged  at  him  were  numerous.  Na- 
turally, then,  the  ones  that  were  not  so  legiti- 
mate were  innumerable. 

There  was  no  thought  of  evil  in  the  hearts  of 
many  whose  shafts  had  been  deemed  wickedly 
reprehensible  by  his  mother,  and  others  who 
took  a  warm,  not  to  say  peppery,  interest  in  his 
welfare.  Portionless  girls,  with  no  particular 
pedigree,  had  been  severely  denounced  for  cast- 
ing upon  him  eyes  of  what  would,  with  culture 
— the  smallest  encouragement — have  develop- 
ed into  affection.  Old  Mrs.  Walsingham  had 
had  bad  dreams  about  dozens  of  respectable 
young  ladies  whose  fair  faces  had  made  an  eva- 
nescent impression  on  her  impressionable  son. 
Her  history  of  the  snares  arid  delusions  that 
had  been  spread  for  him,  and  that  he  had  es- 
caped, thank  heaven,  was  voluminous.  But 
they  had  all  been  respectable  snares  and  delu- 
sions, these  that  Claude  had  confided  to  his 
mother.  The  list  of  those  that  had  been  spread 
— that  were  still,  alas !  spreading — was  incom- 
plete. 

Claude  was  very  precious  in  the  eyes  of  his 
whole  family.  His  father  almost  wished  him- 
self dead  at  times,  in  order  that  the  son  of 
whom  he  was  so  proud  might  enjoy  the  estates 
and  the  glory  of  being  the  head  of  the  house  of 
"Walsignham.  The  old  gentleman  was  stopped 
short  of  wishing  it  entirely,  by  the  reflection 
that  when  dead  he  could  not  see  Claude  in  pos- 
session. He  envied  Hamlet's  father,  to  whom 
it  had  been  given  to  come  back  and  mark  how 
abjectly  Horatio  listened  when  the  Prince  elect- 
ed to  make  a  long  string  of  high-minded  re- 
marks, and  how  readily  pretty  Ophelia  went 
mad  for  the  estimable  orphan. 

His  brothers,  though  they  were  younger  and 
their  lines  were  cast  in  less  pleasant  places,  and 
his  married  sisters,  possessing  other  and  dearer 
interests  of  their  own,  as  might  be  supposed, 
believed  in  him  as  a  handsome,  generous  elder 
brother,  who,  a  "  great  swell >:  abroad,  remains 
a  boy  in  all  but  years  at  home,  is  sure  to  be  be- 
lieved in.  They  vaunted  his  excellencies  to 
their  husbands,  they  made  him  godfather  to  all 
their  children,  they  gave  him  the  freedom  of 
their  homes,  they  made  much  of  him  in  every 
way,  loving  him  above  their  other  brothers  in  a 
way  that,  if  he  had  not  been  Claude,  the  other 
brothers  would  have  been  jealous  o£  But  he 
was  Claude,  therefore  no  one  was  jealous  of 


aught  that  was  bestowed  upon  nim — even  of 
that  by  the  side  of  which  all  else  dwindled  into 
insignificance,  the  great  and  surpassing  love 
which  dwelt  in  his  mother's  heart  for  this  glory 
of  her  race. 

He  was  very  precious  to  them  all,  but  to  her 
he  was  as  God's  sun — utter  darkness  would  be 
over  all  the  earth  for  her  did  a  cloud  obscure 
his  brightness.  She  believed  from  the  bottom 
of  her  heart  that  he  was  as  good  a  man,  as  true 
a  gentleman  and  Christian,  as  she  had  prayed 
night  and  morning  from  the  hour  of  his  birth  he 
might  grow  up  to  be,  and  remain.  He  knew 
of-her  prayers  and  her  fond  belief,  and  never  yet 
had  he  been  clouded  in  his  mother's  eyes. 

But  his  mother's  eyes  were  not  upon  him 
always,  or  indeed  often,  for  they  seldom  left 
their  old  western  county  mansion,  and  Claude's 
was  a  London  life.  "When  they  did  come,  he 
was  her  own  devotional  boy  the  whole  time. 
The  happy  woman  and  proud  mother  dreamt  of 
no  vapour  more  defiling  than  the  cigar  smoke 
she  knew  of  coming  over  him.  He  went  to  the 
opera,  and  to  theatres,  and  balls,  and  breakfasts 
at  two  o'clock  P.M.,  as  usual,  while  his  mother 
was  in  town.  But  he  never  talked  of  supping 
in  Bohemia,  nor  did  he  go  down  to  Richmond  in 
a  much-talked-about  opera-singer's  barouche  to 
dinner,  while  she  remained.  He  returned  his 
mother's  love  to  the  best  of  his  ability — it  was 
not  in  him  to  give  back  quite  all  she  gave ;  but 
he  respected  her  prejudices — amongst  which 
was  a  colossal  one  against  what  she  termed 
"  the  father  of  evils,  playhouses,  and  the  poor 
misguided  ones  who  performed  in  them."  The 
sun  would  have  been  darkened  cruelly  to  her, 
poor  woman,  could  she  but  have  known  that  a 
bewitchingly  pretty  prima  donna,  who  had 
made  a  great  success  by  her  lifelike  exposition 
of  a  Traviata's  woes,  was  singing  Claude  into  a 
state  of  mad  resentment  against  the  world  for 
its  idle  prejudice  relative  to  marrying  a  woman 
of  whose  antecedents  nothing  was  known. 

They  called  her  "  Circe  "  amongst  themselves 
— he  and  the  friends  who  knew  the  case,  and 
watched  the  progress  of  it.  He  was  not  in 
love  with  her — at  least  he  felt  that  he  could  and 
should  love  some  other  woman  better  in  days 
to  come.  But  her  thrilling  voice  made  his  heart 
leap.  Her  inexhaustible  gaiety,  her  apparently 
unfailing  brilliancy,  bewitched  and  dazzled  him 
when  he  was  with  her,  and  she  took  care  that 
he  should  be  with  her  often.  Those  suppers 
after  the  opera  were  bewildering  things  to 
Claude  that  year;  the  wines  and  women  were 
alike  sparkling  and  bright ;  and  she,  the  bright- 
est of  them  all,  sparkled  for  him  alone — he 
thought. 

He  had  never  seen  Circe  by  daylight  yet. 
She  was  young  and  beautiful  exceedingly  on 
the  boards  arid  at  the  after  banquets.  Very 
young  as  to  the  rich  dark  bloom  on  her  cheek 
— very  beautiful  in  the  rare  lace,  black,  full,  and 
loating,  which  she  had  a  trick  of  half  shroud- 
'ng  herself  in,  after  the  fashion  of  a  Spaniard. 

She  had  been  especially  young  and  beautiful 
and  sparkling  on  the  previous  night,  he  remem- 
oered  when  he  rose.    He  also  remembered  that 
le  had  invited  her  and  a  good  many  of  her 
Hends  to  dine  with  him  at  the  "  Star  and  Gar-     , 
;er"  this  day.     Additionally,  the  recollection      \ 
breed  itself  upon  him  that  he  had  said  words 


ON  GUARD. 


13 


of  which  Circe  might  desire  an  explanation,  and 
that  he  was  very  far  from  being  competent  to 
give  one  that  should  alike  seem  good  to  her  and 
to  his  family. 

"  I  wish  I  could  keep  clear  of  her,"  he  mut- 
tered, "or  that  Florry  Villars  was  like  her — in 
some  things.  How  easily  some  fellows  satisty 
themselves.  Stanley,  for  instance,  who  has 
found  what  he  considers  his  fate,  I  suppose,  in 
a  fortnight.  I  own  that  Adele  isn't  the  ideal 
Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham ;  but  I  do  wish  that 
some  girl,  who  would  meet  their  views  in  the 
"West,  had  a  particle  of  Adele's  charms.  It's  a 
shame  to  wish  Florry  altered,  though,  by 
Jove  I" — he  went  on  carefully  adjusting  a 
cream-coloured  rose  in  its  proper  position  upon 
the  lappel  of  his  coat — "I  wonder  whether  the 
interest  would  deepen  or  decrease  if  I  had  her 
with  me  always.  That's  the  devil  of  it:  a  dull 
wife  with  every  womanly  virtue,  from  whom 
there  would  be  no  escape,  would  bring  me  to 
an  untimely  grave.  There  was  something  emo- 
tional, though,  and  pleasantly  exciting,  in  that 
look  she  gave  me  when  I  asked  her  if  her  great 
news  was  that  she  was  going  to  be  married." 

So  he  soliloquised  about  Florry  the  while  he 
was  adjusting  and  readjusting  the  rose,  and 
drawing  on  gloves  that  resembled  the  rose  in 
hue,  and  ivory  in  polish.  He  was  going  to 
drive  Circe  and  her  friends,  and  several  of  his 
own,  down  in  his  drag,  and  he  desired  that 
Circe's  first  daylight  view  of  him  should  be  aus- 
picious. 

He  had  written  to  Stanley  Villars  the  pre- 
vious evening.  "Written  in  a  congratulatory 
strain — but  Stanley  detected  a  half  note  of  dis- 
approval in  it.  "  I  always  thought  that  you 
would  marry  a  girl  as  much  like  your  sister 
Florence  as  possible,"  he  wrote,  from  which 
Stanley  deduced  that  his  old  friend  deemed  that 
he  would  have  been  a  wiser  man  had  he  not 
linked  himself  to  the  very  opposite  of  his  sister 
Florence. 

At  his  club  this  morning  Claude  read  that — 
"  "We  understand  that  a  marriage  is  arranged  to 
take  place  between  the  Eev.  Stanley  Villars, 
second  son  of  the  late  Sir  Gerald  Villars,  Bart., 
and  the  only  daughter  and  heiress  of  the  late 
Philip  Vane,  Esq."  He  read  it  with  a  laughing 
light  contempt  in  his  eyes.  "  Fancy  old  Stan- 
ley going  in  for  the  pomps  and  vanities  in  the 
way  of  this  announcement ! "  he  remarked, 
pointing  out  the  paragraph  to  a  mutual  friend, 
who  forthwith  read  it  and  rejoined — 

"  "Whew  ?  Bella  Vane  going  to  marry  Stan- 
ley I  '  The  devil  was  sick,  the  devil  a  saint 
would  be.'  What's  the  matter  with  her,  I  won- 
der?" 

"Do  you  know  her?" 

"  My  dear  fellow,  know  her !  I  should  think 
I  did.  I  adored  her  during  the  first  part  of  her 
season ;  then  I,  in  common  with  the  rest  of  the 
small  deer,  was  smothered  in  the  strawberry- 
leaves.  She  played  for  the  highest  stake  to  be 
won  last  year.  What  has  brought  her  down  to 
this?" 

"  Villars  is  a  friend  of  mine,"  Claude  replied, 
briefly  and  coldly. 

"  So  he  is  of  mine.  I  think  him  one  of  the 
finest  fellows  that  ever  lived ;  but  I  shall  never 
doubt  that  the  stars  are  fire,  or  but  that  truth  is 
a  liar,  or  anything  indeed  after  this.  Why,  man, 


she  turned  up  her  nose  at  Lord  Lexley  and  his 
thirty  thousand  per  annum.  Shows  you  were 
out  of  town,  your  not  feeling  the  shock  of  sur- 
prise that  I  am  experiencing.  I  wonder,  though, 
that  the  noise  of  her  fame  didn't  penetrate  even 
to  Canada.  She  was  the  greatest  flirt  and  the 
greatest  beauty  we  have  seen  for  years." 

"  Villars  is  just  the  fellow  to  manage  such  a 
woman,  that  is  all  I  have  to  say  about  it,  not 
knowing  the  lady,"  Claude  replied  carelessly ; 
but  for  all  this  assumed  carelessness,  for  all  his 
own  light  regard  of  many  things,  he  felt  sorry 
that  Stanley  should  have  given  his  heart  into 
such  a  woman's  hand.  "Cold  as  he  seems,  he 
will  go  to  the  bad  should  she  ever  crush  it  or 
throw  it  away,"  he  thought.  "  Dear  old  Stan- 
ley, I'll  go  down  and  see  him." 

They  went  to  Richmond.  Down  along  the 
road  that  winds  through  pretty  prosperous  little 
Castlenau,  and  over  Barnes  Common,  Claude 
drove  his  team  of  bays  with  black  points  in  the 
drag  that  was  Circe's  triumphal  car  for  the 
nonce.  She  was  scarcely  so  lovely  by  daylight 
as,  from  having  seen  her  under  the  lamps  alone, 
a  tyro  might  have  expected.  But  Claude  was 
no  tyro,  therefore  he  soon  ceased  to  see  her  sal- 
low ;  he  looked  straight  ahead  at  his  horses,  in 
fact,  and  with  his  eyes  averted,  found  her 
"  devilish  fascinating,"  even  by  daylight. 

I  said  that  Claude  had  promised  to  drive  her 
down,  accompanied  by  some  of  her  friends  and 
his  own.  Her  friends  were  a  pair  of  women 
whom  she  greeted  as  mother  and  sister  when 
occasion  seemed  to  call  for  the  possession  of 
such  relatives.  At  other  times  they  fell  into 
position  as  the  merely  useful  friends  they  were 
— dependent  friends  who  managed  her  esta- 
blishment and  dressed  her  hair,  and  kept  the 
reckless  prima  donna's  affairs  straight,  and  who 
were  ready  to  come  forward  and  take  up  the 
claims  of  kindred  when  a  Claude  Walsingham 
appeared  to  call  for  such  evidence  of  respect- 
ability as  a  mother  and  sister  in  the  flesh,  and 
resident. 

The  elder  of  these  two  women  gave  that  air 
of  weight  and  age  to  the  party  that  is  desirable. 
Her  most  marked  attributes  were  a  power  of 
holding  her  peace  and  adapting  herself  imme- 
diately to  the  rich  clothes  into  which  she  had  to 
rush  whenever  Adele  required  the  countenance 
and  support  of  a  maternal  parent.  The  younger 
woman  was  an  adept  in  the  art  of  exclamation 
— of  admiring,  wondering,  interested  curiosity, 
excited  exclamation !  Now  we  all  like  to  be 
admired  and  wondered  at,  to  be  shown  that  we 
are  interesting,  and  to  be  made  feel  that  our 
smallest  remarks  whet  the  edge  of  the  listener's 
curiosity !  Her  mission  in  life  was  to  amuse 
the  friends  of  Adele's  current  favourite,  and  she 
fulfilled  it  thoroughly.  The  young  men  who 
went  down  on  Claude's  drag  to  Richmond  that 
day  had  plenty  of  height,  but  not  too  much  heart, 
or  head,  or  fancy.  They  were  the  right  men  in 
the  right  place,  for  height  is  one  of  the  touches 
an  artistic-minded  man  will  always  seek  to  give 
when  filling-in  the  picture  his  drag  should  be 
when  "  going,"  and  Victorine,  Adele's  sister, 
suited  them  entirely. 


14 


ON  GUARD. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

AFTER  DINNER. 

THEY  reached  the  "  Star  and  Garter"  about 
seven  that  evening,  and  found  that  in  front  of 
the  hotel  and  in  the  yard  an  equine  confusion, 
and  in  the  house  itself  a  savoury  one,  reigned, 
by  reason  of  there  being  much  company  as- 
sembled for  the  purpose  of  enjoying  viands  that 
might  be  improved  upon,  and  the  views  that 
cannot  be.  Claude,  a  distinguished  member  of 
the  "  four-in-hand,"  brought  his  horses  up  at 
the  door  with  that  suddenly  arrested  rush,  and 
threw  down  the  unstrapped  reins  with  that  ce- 
lerity which  is  very  beautiful  to  behold,  and 
looks  very  easy  till  you  have  tried  to  do  it,  and 
failed  ignominiously.  Then  he  helped  Adele 
down,  and  Adele,  with  much  grace  and  mercy, 
stood  at  the  door  for  a  few  minutes,  resettling 
the  Yak  mantilla  over  her  shoulders,  and  gaz-. 
ing  at  Claude's  horses  through  the  jewelled  eye- 
glass which  looked  too  heavy  for  her  tiny, 
tightly-gloved  hand.  Every  one  has  seen  this 
little  pantomime  gone  through  by  women  who 
have  come  down  in  drags.  Every  one  has  seen 
them  stand  with  apparently  sublime  indiffer- 
ence, and  in  reality  perhaps  with  ridiculous  in- 
terest, to  be  inspected  by  the  common  herd  who 
have  not  come  down  in  like  fashion,  and  who 
are  palpably  in  admiring  awe  of  it, 

Amongst  the  many  equipages  that  were 
around  and  being  led  away  from  and  dashing 
up  (as  he  had  done  a  minute  before)  to  the  en- 
trance, Claude  recognised  young  Lady  Yillars' 
landau.  Before  he  had  time  to  collect  his 
forces,  and  induce  Adele  to  drop  her  glass  and 
turn  round,  and  sweep  into  the  house,  he  saw 
Lady  Villars  descend  from  it,  followed  by  her 
sister-in-law,  Florry.  So  he  went  in  hurriedly 
through  the  door  by  himself,  leaving  Adele 
standing  there  gazing  with  her  lovely,  listless 
eyes  at  the  new  arrivals. 

Went  in  and  looked  at  the  room  he  had  or- 
dered, and  the  preparations  that  were  being 
made  for  their  reception,  with  more  earnestness 
than  the  waiters  had  ever  seen  him  display  be- 
fore. Went  in  cursing  the  chance  that  had 
brought  the  Villarses  there  to-day,  and  the  fate 
that  kept  him  from  joining  them,  and  even 
Circe  herself,  for  being  the  Circe  that  she  was. 

He  almost  loathed  her,  as  he  stood  there  in 
the  room  that  was  so  radiant  and  so  exquisitely 
adorned  with  flowers  that  he  had  ordered  but 
yesterday  for  her.  He  felt  a  repugnance  to  that 
beauty  of  hers  which  she  was  now  employed  in 
bringing  out  in  bold  relief  on  the  door  step. 
He  could  not  bear  the  idea  of  Florence — his 
friend  Stanley's  sister,  his  own  sweet,  smiling 
friend — passing  close  to,  and  being  scrutinized 
by,  the  woman  he  had  driven  down.  Still  less 
could  he  bear  the  idea  of  Florence  arriving  at  a 
knowledge  of  his  having  done  so,  and  of  her 
discovering  that  he  had  in  consequence  shrunk 
from  a  meeting  with  her.  He  almost  loathed 
the  Circe  of  this  period  of  his  life,  as  he  stood 
there  gnawing  the  ends  of  his  moustache. 

But  this  was  before  dinner. 

They  all  came  in  presently,  Adele  herself, 
•with  her  bonnet  off  and  a  tempered  bloom  on 
her  face,  and  Victorine  ecstatic,  and  the  re- 
spectable lady,  their  mamma,  still  great  at  hold  - 


ing  her  peace.  Claude  put  away  his  thoughts  oi 
Florry,  and  would  not  harbour  the  reflection 
that  she  might  perchance  be  in  the  next  room. 
That  is  to  say,  he  nearly  put  them  away,  but  a 
sore  feeling  would  obtain  occasionally,  after 
hearing  that  Sir  Gerald  Villars  had  followed  his 
wife  in  his  phaeton,  accompanied  by  Lord  Lex- 
ley.  Lord  Lexley  was  a  man  who  was  unfetter- 
ed in  every  sense  of  the  word.  He  had  neither 
debts,  nor  a  wife,  nor  bad  habits,  to  the  best  of 
the  world's  belief. 

It  was  horrible  for  Claude  to  contemplate  this 
little  party  of  four—before  dinner. 

It  grew  less  horrible  gradually  under  the  in- 
fluence of  white  Hermitage.  He  left  champagne 
to  the  women,  and  what  he  left  was  not  wast- 
ed. After  gradually  diminishing  during  the 
dinner  itself,  it  died  out  in  a  burst  of  song — the 
drinking  song  of  a  new  opera — that  Adele 
gave,  and  she  was  all  the  queen  of  his  soul 
again,  vice  Florence  Yillars  absent,  but  not 
"  resigned." 

The  night  was  very  fair.  Those  terraced  bal- 
conies leading  down  from  the  room  in  which 
they  sat  to  the  river  below,  were  laden  with 
flowers,  and  the  air  was  heavy  with  their 
sweetness.  They  leant  out  of  the  window — he, 
the  giver  of  this  festival  of  which  she  was  the 
queen,  and  Adele — and  she  sang  bright  bursts 
of  song  that  the  flowers  turned  to  listen  to,  and 
the  stars  wished  they  were  below  to  hear  more 
clearly  still.  "What  wonder  that  he  saw  her  fair 
as  the  night — bright  as  the  stars — sweet  as  the 
flowers  that  bloomed  before  them  ?  What  won- 
der, being  what  he  was,  that  he  forgot  his 
mother's  prejudices  and  Florry  Villars'  gentle 
love  for  him,  and  she  rang  out  strains  sparkling 
as  the  champagne  she  had  imbibed,  and  he 
listened  to  them  under  the  influence  of  the 
moon  and  white  Hermitage. 

They  went  out  at  last — out  on  to  the  balcony, 
and  then  down  the  steps,  to  look  into  the  piece 
of  water  over  which  that  willow  weeps.  Her 
dress,  as  she  swept  along  hanging  on  his  arm, 
brushed  against  the  flowers,  and  more  intoxi- 
cating odours  arose,  and  she  was  very  fair.  He 
remembered  all  the  warm  mentions  of  her 
beauty  that  he  had  heard  made  at  divers  times, 
and  forgot  the  sallow  tinge  that  he  had  seen 
during  the  drive  down,  as  he  stood  by  her  side, 
and  she  looked  into  the  water,  and  suffered  her 
voice  to  ripple  in  melody  soft  and  golden  as  the 
moonlight ;  and  he  drew  her  arm  more  closely 
within  his  own,  and  the  fumes  of  the  wine  he 
had  drunk  mingled  with  the  woman's  beauty, 
and  mounted  to  his  brain. 

Her  head,  shrouded  by  some  lace,  from  under 
the  folds  of  which  her  beauty  shone  out  lustrous- 
ly, inclined  nearer  to  him  as  she  sang  on  in  a 
very  low  tone  now.  Her  scented  hair  fell  in 
rich  curls,  from  the  classical  knot  into  which  it 
was  gathered  behind,  upon  his  shoulder.  Her 
beauty  was  very  patent  to  him  at  that  moment, 
and  he  suddenly  desired  to  have  it  for  his  own. 

"  Adele,"  he  said,  "could  I  suffice  to  you — 
could  you  live  without  public  applause  and  the 
adoration  of  empty-headed  fools " 

"  Ah  1  Claude,  for  you !" 

She  said  it  in  a  tone  that  implied  that  she 
could  be  capable  of  anything  for  him.  The  tone 
said  this  distinctly,  but  she  purposely  made  the 
words  devoid  of  too  clear  a  meaning.  She  had 


ON  GUARD. 


15 


no  intention  of  committing  herself  until  she 
clearly  understood  the  nature  of  the  terms 
Claude  proposed. 

44  Then  leave  them  for  me,  and  be  mine 
alone,"  he  cried;  but  even  as  he  said  it,  even  as 
he  flung  his  arm  round  her,  and  drew  her  un- 
resisting beauty  closer  to  his  breast,  he  could  not 
help  marvelling  how  she  would  look  in  the 
quiet,  old  home  in  the  West;  and  what  he 
should  do  with  the  presents  other  men  had 
lavished  upon  her. 

She  paused  for  a  minute,  apparently  in  the 
quietude  of  very  passion,  in  reality  because  she 
could  not,  for  that  space  of  time,  decide  which 
would  be  her  wisest  course.  She  was  a  queen 
of  song  now,  feted  and  paid  as  such,  but  her 
voice  might  give  way,  or  another  arise  to  eclipse 
her  before  long.  It  occurred  to  her  that  it  would 
be  well  to  fasten  him  to  his  suggestion  without 
further  delay,  so  she  remembered  her  mamma 
in  an  instant. 

"  Claude,  I  will  leave  them  all  for  you— even 
my  mother.  Ah  1  how  shall  I  tell  her  and  Vic- 
torine,  who  will  die  to  leave  me ;  but  I  must  tell 
them." 

"There's  no  immediate  hurry,  Adele," 
Claude  observed. 

His  faith  in  Adele's  mamma  was  not  nearly 
so  perfect  a  thing  as  Adele  imagined  it  to  be. 
Moreover,  the  difficulty  of  disposing  of  those 
articles  of  jewellery — gifts  of  those  who  had 
preceded  him — was  more  vividly  before  him 
every  moment. 

"But  I  could  not  leave  her  in  doubt — a  mo- 
!  ment  after  my  heart  has  been  assured  of  that 
for  which  it  has  longed,"  Adele  said.  The  first 
part  of  her  speech  had  the  true,  genuine  (stage) 
daughter's  ring  about  it,  the  latter  portion  was 
redolent  of  the  sweet  inconsequence  of  love's 
young  dream. 

He  relaxed  his  warm  clasp  a  little.  It  an- 
noyed him  to  think  that  Adele  should  be  in 
such  a  hurry  to  go  and  talk  about  it.  It  had 
been  due — this  abrupt  proposal  of  his — to  the 
moonlight  and  the  melody  in  a  measure,  and  he 
wanted  more  moonlight  and  melody;  he  did 
not  want  to  go  in  and  read,  in  the  faces  of  his 
tall  young  friends,  that  he  had  made  a  mistake. 
"  Tell  me,  has  your  heart  longed  for  this  as- 
surance, Adele,"  he  whispered.  He  did  not 
quite  believe  in  her  warm  declaration  that  it 
had  done  so;  but  the  declaration  had  been 
uttered  in  tones  that  the  first  soprano  had 
known  how  to  render  most  seductively  soft,  and 
he  wanted  to  hear  them  again. 

So  she  uttered  them  again,  with  but  slight 
variation  of  words  and  no  variation  of  meaning. 
She  wisely,  having  once  worded  a  phrase  tha 
sounded  well,  adhered  to  that  phrase,  and  made 
no  weak  attempts  to  improve  upon  it.  Too 
much  revision  is  as  bad  as  none  at  all. 

Once  more,  therefore,  she  averred  that  her 
heart  had  longed  for  this  assurance,  and  once 
more  she  asserted  that  it  behoved  her  to  go  in 
and  tell  her  anxious  parent  that  it  had  been 
given.  Then  he,  feeling  that  copious  draughts 
of  the  wine  of  the  South  were  needed  by  him  in 
this  hour  of  his  acceptance  by  the  daughter  o: 
the  same,  went  in  and  saw  Adele  make  manl 
fest  how  weak  he  had  been  out  in  the  garden 
It  was  after  dinner  now,  and  the  anxious 
parent  was  no  longer  so  great  at  holding  her 


eace  as  she  had  been.  She  was  naturally  re- 
oiced  at  what  had  transpired,  and  Yictoriue 
was  vivaciously  resigned  to  the  loss  of  her 
ister,  who  would  leave,  "ah!  such  triumphs 
or  this  love  of  hers."  It  was  after  dinner,  with 
lis  tall  young  friends  also,  and  they  laughed 
more  than  was  seemly  when  they  congratulat- 
ed him  on  the  great  conquest  he  had  made  over 
many  things.  Yes,  Claude  had  full  need  of  the 
most  care-dispelling  vintage  the  cellars  of  the 
Star  and  G-arter  "  could  supply,  in  order  to  be 
able  to  bear  the  brunt  of  that  tide  of  feeling 
which  swept  o'er  him  in  this  first  hour  of  his 
engagement  to  Circe. 

What  a  glorious  gipsy  queen  she  looked, 
though,  when  late  that  night  they  were  about  to 
start  from  the  door.  There  had  been  much 
wishing  them  happiness  in  cups  of  sparkling 
wine,  and  hers  was  the  steadiest  progress  made 
by  that  party  through  the  hall,  not  even  except- 
ing Claude's  own.  She  swept  along  "  like  a 
queen  in  a  play  that  night,"  and  held  her 
triumph-flushed  face  aloft  in  a  way  none  of  the 
others  were  capable  of  doing.  Claude  hung 
over  her  as  she  moved  along,  fairly  enraptured 
afresh,  for  she  was  glorious,  in  the  pomp  of  her 
beauty,  grand  in  the  management  of  that  fiery 
thing,  her  natural  manner.  She  would  well 
adorn  the  proudest  home  he  could  place  her  in, 
he  told  himself.  She  had  the  physique  of  one 
who  might  be  the  mistress  of  a  palace.  How 
men  would  turn  and  look  when  he  drove  her 
through  the  park.  How  every  glass  would  be 
turned  to  the  box  when  she,  the  former  queen 
of  its  board,  should  sit  at  the  opera.  How 
Florry  Villars  started,  and  exclaimed,  "Oh! 
Claude — Major  Walsingham,"  at  this  juncture, 
as  they  came  suddenly  in  collision  with  Sir 
Gerald  Villars'  party  at  the  door,  and  Adele,  in 
her  scarlet  mantle,  bore  down  in  proud,  pictu- 
resque beauty  upon  her  gentle,  unconscious 
rival. 

Then  he  cursed  afresh  that  hour  by  the  water, 
in  the  flower-scented  garden,  and  shrank,  excit- 
ed as  he  was,  from  the  caressing  weight  that 
woman  laid  upon  his  arm.  She,  in  her  pride  of 
Bacchanal  beauty,  was  no  fitting  mistress  for 
that  grand,  honourable  old  home  of  his  fathers 
—for  that  house  whose  women  had  all  been 
pure  and  unknown.  He  could  take  no  notice 
of  Florence's  exclamation;  he  dared  not  meet 
her  eyes ;  so  he  hurried  his  companion  on,  and 
into  the  drag  tumultuously,  and  suffered  his 
horses  to  take"  the  road  home,  in  an  eager  burst, 
in  which  he  was  not  wont  to  indulge  them  in 
that  hilly  Richmond  street. 

"So  you  went  over  the  brink  to-night,  old 
fellow!"  one  of  his  companions  said,  when  he 
had  deposited  Adele  and  her  relatives  at  their 
house  in  South  Audley  Street,  and  the  rest 
were  wending  their  way  back  rapidly  to  their 
respective  quarters. 

"  I  have  been  a  damned  fool ;  but  I'd  thank 
you  not  to  mention  it,"  Claude  rejoined ;  and 
the  man  who  had  no  wish  to  be  other  than 
thanked  by  Claude,  resolved  that  he  wouldn't 
mention  it  yet. 

Claude  Walsingham  was  in  a  hard,  cruel 
humour  that  night.  The  excitement  was  over, 
and  when  he  had  put  down  the  last  man  at  that 
man's  quarters,  he  drove  on  alone  to  his  own  at 
a  hard,  cruel  pace  The  beauty  of  the  woman 


1G 


ON  GUARD. 


who  had  stood  out  under  the  stars  with  him  was 
less  vividly  before  him  than  the  aught  but  tame 
publicity  she  had  attained.  It  seemed  to  him 
that  with  Adele  for  a  wife,  life  to  be  endurable 
must  be  all  driving  at  a  rate  that  would  abolish 
thought,  and  drinking  wine  to  the  exclusion  of 
reflection.  As  he  came  to  this  conclusion,  he 
cursed  his  folly — the  folly  that  would  have  been 
blind  in  a  boy  even — and  lashed  his  horses 
afresh,  and  they  rattled  over  the  stones  in  Pic- 
cadilly at  a  rate  he  would  not  have  driven  them 
had  he  been  well  with  himself  just  then. 

But  he  was  far  from  being  well  with  himself; 
he  was  so  ill  with  himself,  indeed,  that  he  in- 
dulged in  a  savage  regret  that  he  had  not  secur- 
ed oblivion,  at  least  for  this  night,  through  the 
medium  of  that  syren  wine  which  had  lured  him 
on  to  the  commission  of  that  of  which  he  now 
repented.  Whatever  of  intoxication  there  had 
been  when  that  subtle  crowning  spell  was 
thrown  round  him  down  in  the  garden  by  the 
river,  was  gone  now.  He  was  thoroughly  sober, 
and  his  sobriety  was  a  cause  of  regret,  for  it  ena- 
bled him  to  think. 

The  road  was  tolerably  clear,  for  the  hour  was 
late  now,  and  the  heavy,  huge  drag  loomed  out 
so  largely  that  it  gave  fair  warning  of  its  ap- 
proach, swift  as  that  approach  was,  and  so  en- 
abled the  few  foot  passengers  who  were  abroad 
to  get  out  of  the  way.  At  the  entrance  to  Gros- 
venor  Place,  however,  he  was  compelled  to  pull 
up  suddenly,  in  order  to  avoid  a  woman  who 
rushed  out  of  the  dark  shade  by  the  purposeless 
arch,  in  order  to  be  run  over,  or  to  give  him  the 
trouble  of  sparing  her  that  fate.  He  saw  that 
she  escaped,  that  she  was  clear  of  the  possibility 
of  being  mangled  under  his  wheels,  and  with  a 
curse  at  her  carelessness,  he  was  preparing  to 
drive  on  again  at  the  old  pace.  But  there  was 
a  something  in  the  tone  of  the  answering  cry 
she  gave  to  his  maledictory  caution  that  made 
him  pull  up,  and  shout  to  one  of  his  servants  to 
"  get  out  and  see  what  was  the  matter." 

"  It's  only  her  dog  you've  gone  over,  sir,"  his 
man  told  him,  touching  his  hat,  and  preparing  to 
get  in  again ;  but  Claude  ordered  him  to  "  stand 
at  their  heads,"  and  jumped  down  from  the  box 
at  once,  and  went  back  to  where  the  woman 
stood  with  a  small  crowd  about  her  now,  look- 
ing down  upon  the  ground,  where  a  little,  heav- 
ing, bleeding  mass  lay— dying. 

The  tall,  fair  young  gentleman  with  the  flower 
in  his  coat,  and  that  aroma  of  good  breeding 
about  him  which  the  masses  rarely  fail  to  recog- 
nise, cleft  his  way  through  the  crowd  in  an  in 
stant.  "  "What  is  the  matter  ?"  he  asked  very 
gently  of  the  woman,  an  elderly  dame  with  one 
of  those  broad,  rosy  faces  on  which  sorrow  sits 
so  very  sadly ;  and  she  answered  him  at  once, 
touched  by  the  gentleness  of  his  tone,  without 
an  atom  of  reproach  in  her  own — 

"  Oh !  yer  honour,  it's  my  little  dog  I  killed, 
sir!" 

"  Only  a  little  mangy  cur  what's  better  dead 
than  alive,  sir,"  a  policeman  interposed  gruffly. 
"Now  you  clear  out,  and  don't  be  a  begging  of 
the  gentleman  'carse  your  dog  run  under  his 
wheels,"  he  added  to  the  woman. 

"  You  clear  out,  and  let  me  see  if  the  poor 
dog  is  dead,"  Claude  said  haughtily.  Then  he 
stooped  down,  and  with  the  slender  hands  that 
were  so  carefully  encased  in  the  cream-coloured 


vory-polished  gloves,  he  picked  up  the  poor 
ittle  mangled  animal  that  had  been  writhing  at 
his  feet.  There  had  been  hardness  and  cruelty 
in  his  heart,  as  he  had  driven  along  recklessly ; 
but  now,  as  he  stood  looking  at  the  result  of 
that  reckless  driving,  there  was  nothing  but 
tenderness  in  it,  and  he  felt  inexpressibly 
shocked  and  softened. 

"  I  would  have  given  something  not  to  have 
done  it.  My  good  woman,  there  is  nothing  to 
be  done  for  him,  or  on  my  honour  I'd  do  it." 
Then  he  laid  down  the  dog  again,  and  put  some 
money  in  the  woman's  hand ;  and  she  "  blest 
him  for  a  kind  gentleman,"  and  tried  to  forgive 
him  the  death  of  her  dog. 

It  was  but  a  poor  half-bred  black  and  tan  ter- 
rier, rough  and  unkempt  in  appearance,  which 
had  come  to  this  evil  end.  He  saw  that  it  was 
just  these  things  and  no  more — yes,  thus  much 
more  he  saw,  that  the  poor  little  dog  had  been 
palpably  that  woman's  friend,  possibly  her  com- 
fort. Its  dying  eyes  had  turned  lovingly  to- 
wards her,  and  he  had  marked  that  last  appeal 
with  a  keen  remorse.  The  man  who  made 
life  appointments  with  dubious  people  under 
the  influence  of  wine,  and  lived  in  an  atmo- 
sphere which  he  deemed  defiling,  when  he 
thought  of  Florry  Villars  or  his  mother,  had  a 
tender  heart.  Claude  cursed  his  folly  no  more 
that  night ;  indeed,  he  thought  of  little  else  save 
the  ruii  he  had  brought  upon  that  humble 
union,  and  regretted  nothing  so  much  as  the 
death  of  the  little  dog. 


CHAPTER  V. 

BELLA   TRIES  THE  PATH   OF  DUTY. 

"AND  what  have  you  finally  decided  upon 
doing?  staying  on  here  for  awhile  or  going 
away  ?"  Stanley  Villars  asked  of  his  betrothed, 
when  his  betrothed  had  rapidly  recited  to  him 
the  divers  emotions  that  had  chased  each  other 
through  her  mind  during  the  dull  solitude  of 
that  morning. 

"  Oh,  Stanley  1  now  is  it  likely  that  I  should 
come  to  the  decision  of  '  going  away'  quite  of 
my  own  free  will  ?  I  shall  stay  here  while  I 
can — while  mamma  can  spare  me." 

She  believed  herself  to  be  speaking  the  en- 
tire truth.  In  his  presence  she  forgot  the  un- 
controllable desire  to  be  off  and  away  from  this 
place,  which  had  obtained  dominion  while  she 
was  alone. 

"  Then  Claude  "Walsingham  won't  have  his 
journey  for  nothing,  as  I  have  feared  he  would 
a  minute  ago.  I  have  heard  from  him  this  morn- 
ing, telling  me  that  he  means  to  come  down 
and  quarter  himself  upon  me  for  a  few  days." 

"  Claude  "Walsingham!  isn't  he  a " 

"A  what?" 

"  Well,  a  very  agreeable — no,  that's  not  the 
phrase — a  very  fascinating  man,  Stanley ;  very 
gay  and  reckless,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing." 

"  Is  '  all  that  sort  of  thing'  so  fascinating  ?     I 
don't  know  that  he  is  fascinating,  but  he  is  a 
very  good  friend  of  mine,  and  I  shall  be  glad\ 
when  you  know  him  if  you  can  endorse  my  1  v 
favourable  opinion." 


ON  GUARD. 


17 


"  What  made  you  say  tliat,  a  minute  ago, 
you  half  feared  Claude  Walsingham  would  have 
his  journey  for  nothing  ?" 

"  I  half  feared  that  you  would  be  gone." 
"  Oh,  Stanley !  you  only  suffer  half  fears  on 
my  account ;  you  ought  to  be  miserable  at  the 
notion  of  losing  me."  The  great  beaut}r  clasped 
her  little  hands  more  closely  round  his  arm — 
this  pantomime  took  place  in  a  leafy  alley  of  a 
very  secluded  old  garden,  be  it  remembered — 
and  looked  up  into  his  face  with  a  glow  of  re- 
proach on  her  own  as  she  spoke. 

"I  should  be  miserable  enough  at  the  notion 
of  losing  you— miserable  enough  to  satisfy  even 
you,  Bella;  but  your  going  away  for  a  time, 
whether  that  time  be  long  or  short,  is  not  losing 
you  while  we  love  each  other." 

His  tone  was  deep,  earnest,  thoughtful ;  she 
knew  that  he  thoroughly  meant  what  he  said. 
But  for  all  that  conviction,  a  less  reasonable 
speech  would  have  been  more  taking. 

"  Your  views  are  too  transcendental  for  me 
to  share,  Stanley.  Perhaps  you  wouldn't  call 
it '  losing  me1  if  I  went  away  for  ever,  provided 
'  we  loved  one  another  still  ?' " 

"  Unquestionably  I  should  not,  darling ! 
While  we  both  are,  what  I  hope  and  believe 
we  are,  and  shall  remain,  we  cannot  be  lost  to 
each  for  ever." 

She  dropped  his  arm  with  a  little  shiver — a 
little  irrepressible  revulsion  of  feeling  possessed 
her  for  a  few  moments.  He  was  right,  she 
knew,  in  the  abstract.  But  this  knowledge  did 
not  make  the  enunciation  of  these  right  views 
one  bit  more  palatable  to  her. 

"  Don't  talk  to  me  in  that  way  just  yet, 
Stanley!"  she  pleaded  almost  wistfully,  after  a 
short  silence. 

"In  what  way,  Bella?"  He  was  calm,  rea- 
sonable, and  superior,  and  again  Bella's  spirit 
revolted. 

"  About  not  caring  for  my  love  till  we  both 
get  to  heaven." 

"  My  dear  girl,  how  shockingly  you  pervert 
my  words  and  meaning  in  your  impatience." 

"That's  what  I  understood  you  to  mean, 
Stanley ;  and  it  does  sound  cold-blooded,  and 
methodistical  besides.  If  you  don't  care  .for  .me 
in  this  world,  or  want  me  to  care  for  you,  it's  a 
pity  that  you  told  me  you  did,  and  made  me 
tell  you  the  same ;  I  should  have  been  happier 
with  a  .sinner  who  cared  for  me,  than  with  a 
saint  who  does  not." 

The  tears  were  in  her  big  blue  eyes,  standing 
on  her  long  straight  lashes,  rolling  over  the 
flushed  cheeks.  The  pious  young  divine,  with 
the  well-regulated  mind,  was  shocked,  but  he 
could*  not  deem  her  a  very  miserable  sinner. 
Perhaps  this  toleration  was  due  to  the  fact  of 
the  unregenerate  heart  being  unruly  on  his  own 
account. 

"  Dearest,  I  am  weak  and  erring  as  yourself." 
"  Oh !  don't  /"  the  girl  cried  passionately. 
He  thought  that  she  was  touched  and  affected 
by  his  allusion  to  himself  as  a  fellow-sinner. 
Stanley  Villars  was  a  clever,  good  young  man, 
but  his  talent  and  goodness  left  him  powerless 
to  fathom  the  utter  weariness,  the  contemptu- 
ous weariness,  that  filled  the  spirit  of  the  girl  at 
his  side  as    she   heard  him   use  phrases  that 
sounded  like  the  commonest  cant  to  her.     If 
good  people  only  knew  the  mischief  they  do  by 
2 


putting  their  goodness  before  others  in  set  sen- 
tences, how  silent  they  would  be  very  often. 

He  thought  that  he  would  take  a  more 
sprightly  tone  with  this  dispirited  penitent — a 
tone  that,  to  his  mind,  savoured  of  hilarity. 

"  You  want  something  to  change  the  current 
of  your  thoughts,  Bella ;  you  are  rather  down 
this  morning,  and  you  require  a  little  healthy 
excitement." 

"  I  know  I  do,"  she  interrupted ;  "  let  us  go 
for  a  ride,  Stanley — a  good  long  ride,  that  will 
keep  us  out  until  dinner." 

She  asked  him  quite  joyously  to  join  her  in 
this  pleasure,  and  all  the  brightness  was  back 
in  the  tones  of  her  voice ;  but  the  joyousness 
and  brightness  were  of  short  duration. 

"  I  have  no  time  for  long  rides  in  the  mid- 
dle of  the  day,  Bella;  you  know  that  very 
well." 

"  You  never  have  time  for  anything  I  a%k 
you  to  do,"  she  answered,  impatiently;  "what 
prevents  your  devoting  such  an  enormous  space 
of  time,  as  from  now  till  dinner  would  be,  to 
me  to-day  ?" 

"  I  thought  I  had  told  you  that  the  girls  who 
are  preparing  for  confirmation  came  to  me  from 
three  till  five." 

"Had  you  told  me? — perhaps  you  had,"  she 
replied,  wearily.  "Well.  I  suppose  it's  all 
proper  enough;  you  undertook  to  do  such 
things." 

She  dropped  his  arm  now,  and  turned  away 
to  gather  a  flower,  humming  an  opera  air,  and 
trying  not  to  get  flushed  with  annoyance. 

"  And  you  have  undertaken  to  aid  me  in  the 
fulfilment  of  my  duty ;  remember  that,  Bella, 
dearest." 

"  I  am  a  poor  aid ;  I  can  only  tell  you  that 
it's  three  o'clock  now,"  Bella  rejoined. 

"  You  may  be  a  great  aid  to  me,  my  darling." 
He  took  her  hand  as  he  said  this,  and  Bella 
struggled  with  herself,  and  managed  to  say — 

"I  will  try  to  be,  Stanley — really  I  will ; 
but  is  it  always  to  be  like  this? — am  I  never  to 
be  first  with  you?" 

Then  he  made  her  feel  sick  at  heart  again  by 
telling  her  that  they  each  had  higher  duties  to 
perform  towards  God  than  towards  each  other ; 
and  that  it  behoved  them  to  attend  to  these 
higher  duties  first. 

"  I'll  try  to  ascend  to  your  more  perfect  air, 
Stanley,"  she  said  to  him  when  he  had  conclu- 
ded, "  but  I  must  do  it  by  degrees,  or  the  rari- 
fication  of  it  will  kill  me.  A  stone  saint,  with 
her  hands  eternally  clasped,  would  have  been 
a  more  congenial  wife  to  you  than  I  shall  ever 
be,  I  fear." 

When  she  said  that,  he,  despite  his  calm  de- 
votion to  his  parish  duties,  and  that  theory  he 
held  as  to  the  impossibility  of  the  loved  and 
loving  being  ever  lost,  wished  ardently  that  he 
could  make  her  his  own  congenial  wife,  never 
to  be  torn  from  his  side  in  either  the  spirit  or 
the  flesh,  at  once. 

But  this  ardent  desire  could  not  be  gratified, 
so  he  went  off  to  his  confirmation  class,  and 
Bella  went  in  and  strove  to  wear  the  time  away 
by  questioning  her  aunt,  good,  prosy  Mrs.  Vane, 
as  to  how  she  had  come  to  like  doing  "parish 
work,"  and  perpetually  pottering,  physically 
and  spiritually,  about  and  amongst  her  hus- 
band's flock.  "For  no  human  being  can  bo 


IS 


ON  GUABD. 


born  with  a  taste  for  it."  argued  Bella,  "  so  it 

_  ow  upon  me  in  time." 
Later  in  the  week  Miss  Vane  had  a  letter 
from  her  mamma — a  judicious  letter,  informing 
:  every  one  was  wondering  why  she  was 
going   to   marry   Stanley   Yillars,   who. 
younger  son,  had  little  besides  his  curacy.     "  I 

-   myself  surprised,"  Mrs.   Yane   wrote;  ' 
"  had  he  been  a  bishop,  it  would  not  have  been 
aordinary ;  as  it  is,  you  must  change 
Vfore  you  will  be  fit  for  a  mere  clergy - 
\ 

"  Of  course,  I  shall  change  vastly ;  I  mean  I 
shall  change  quite  as  much  as  there's  any  neces- 
sity for  my  changing."  Bella  said  to  "herself, 
clinging  more  closely-  to  Stanley  the  instant 
there  was  a  doubt  thrown  upon  the  wisdom  of 
her  choice  of  him.  U0f  course,  I  shall  adapt 
myself  to  his  career ;  and  no  one  has  any  right 
to.  dictate  to  me.  I  shall  be  very  hap; 
a  '  mere  clergyman,'  as  mamma  calls  him!  TYho 
wouldn't  be  happy  with  Stanley,  I  should  like 
to  kn. 

She  had  not  seen  Stanley  for  a  day  or  two 
when  she  said  this.  His  parochial  duties  had 
absorbed  him  entirely,  he  had  informed  her  in 
a  brace  of  brief  i.  -  beginning  to 

hunger  and  thirst  for  his  society  again,  her 

:  .^Id  her,  because  she  loved  him  s 
But  the  heart  is  deceitful  above  all  thi:  _  i     - 
it  might  have  been  only  because  she  had  no 

amuse  her. 

On  the  Saturday,  Mr.  Stanley  Yillars  came  up 
to  tne  rectory,  and  gladdened  the  heart  of  the 
>  niece.  He  recounted  all  he  had  done, 
all  the  difficulties  he  had  encountered  and  sur- 
mounted (he  hoped)  in  the  unregenerate  hearts 
of  the  candidates  for  confirmation ;  Bella  listen- 
ing, and  trying,  with  all  her  sweet  will,  to  sym- 
pathise with  him.  and  failing,  failing  still ! 

:uade  a  petition  before  he.left  u  I  should 
help  you.  Stanley.     Can  I  do  anything 
0  ? — copy  sermons,  or  anything?" 

— nnons  was  her  only  idea  of  help- 
..an.     She  made  the  offer  warmly, 
-  j.uley  rejected  it  in  a  way  that  made  her 
feel  she  had  erred  again. 

"  I  don't  want  to  see  my  own  poor  words  re- 
produced, Bella,  thank  you ;  I  am  not  likely  to 
need  them  a  second  time ;  but  you  can  help"  me 
in  another  way." 
"Ho 

"  Will  you  pro  if  I  tell  you?" 

-\\s.'  she  said  promptly.  She  would  try 
anything,  no  matter  how  horrid. 

-  There  is  nothing  4  horrid'  in  what  I  propose, 
Bella;  take  one  of  my  classes  off  my  bands  at 

-ohooL" 
"01  go  amongst  those  children  f 

-  You  will  not  essay  to  do  them  such  poor 
service  .as  you  may  do  them,  Bella!"  he  said 
with  some  severity. 

"  If  it  is  sure  to  be  such  poor  service,  why 
should  I  put  myself  out  to  render  it  .  riM 
retorted, 

"Simply  because  it  is  your  d 

"  m  try  to  do  that  indeed  I  will,  Stanley," 
she  said,  with  a  sudden  humility  that  came 
partly  from  remembering  her  mother's  sarcasms, 
and  partly  from  her  genuine  desire  to  please 
him. 

-  And  if  you  try  earnestly,  you  wffl  succeed, 


in  a  measure  at  least,"  he  rejoined ;  which  was 

-utisfactory  to  Bella  of  course,  and  pre- 
cisely the  sort  of  "thing  to  lighten  that  da: 
of  hers  which  he  lamented. 

>-inday  morning  found  her  at  the  school, 
diverting  the  attention  of  the  regular  paid 
teachers,  and  wearying  over  the  task  the  per- 
formance of  which  was  to  quality  her  for  a  posi- 
tion on  high  with  Stanley  Yillars.  '•  If  only 
they  are  good  who  do  these  things  vfi. 
how  bad  I  must  be!"  she  thought  to  herself 

-  U  in  an  atmosphere  that  she  thanked 
the  Lor         -          .  familiar  one  to  her.  and  en- 
deavoured to  concentrate  the  children's  atten- 
tion on  something  besides  her  bonnet  and  g 
She  could  not  help  feeling  that  the  • 
world  of  good  ventilation  and  sw 

•'.;r  preferable  place  to  this  corner  of  the 
Lord's  vineyard,  over  the  door  of  which  • 
my  Ian  /.ten  in  me  I 

the  attempt  to  decipher  which  had  driven  many 
a  child  into  a  state  of  despondency  as  to  its 
prospects  of  ultimately  being  able  to  "  read  off 
anything."    She  could  but  glance  ev 
of  "the  book  she  held  at  Stanley,  and  feel  that 
he  might  as  well  have  left  such  feeding  to  those 
who  were  capable  of  doing  it  to  the  full  i 
as  him  and  herself,  and  who  were  not  made  to 
feel  miserably  ill  through  doing  it.     Then  his 
patience  over  that  from  which  his  taste  must 
have  revolted  would  occur  to  her  vividly 
beautiful  thing  it  was ;  and  she  would  put  away 
her  rebellious  thoughts,  and  pray  to  feel  as  she 
ought  to  feel  about  this  that  he  had  u 
was  a  "duty"  for  a  while. 

••I  think  strong  women,  with  robust  consti- 
tutions, and  a  deficiency  of  development  in  one 
at  least  of  their  senses,  must  ma 
clergymen's  wives."  she  thought  as  she  i 
to  church  after  an  improving  hour  in  the  school 
u  I  feel  sick  now,  and  I  shall  most  like/ 
a  headache  when  I  have  knelt  for  nve  u. 
bad  air  -    -:rves  me  so;    and  to  make 

things  better,  Stanley  will  think  me  a  sinner 
for  indulging  in  such  weaknesses.  He  is  so 
good!" 

-y  good,  and  very  dear  to  her. 
She  kept  on  telling  herself  these  "things  at  in- 
service.  She  employed  the 
interims  in  turning  the  various  beautiful  phrases 
in  which  she  would  make  him  absolute  lord  of 
all  she  possessed,  and  implore  him  to  leave 
these  "  duties,"  the  fulfilment  of  whicl 
rated  him  so  entirely  from  her ;  for  again  she 
told  herself,  "  I  cannot  breathe  in  such  a  per- 
fect air." 


CHAPTER  VI. 
cy  THE  emu. 

"illars,  when 

he  refused  to  go  out  for  a  ride  with  her  on  ac- 
count of  a  certain  duty  intervening,  t. 
•;  supposed  it  was  all  proper ;   he  had  under- 
taken to  do  such  things."    Now.  after  : 
attempt  in  the  Sunday  school,  she  told  i 
that  she  had  not  undertaken  to  do  such 
when  she  promised  to  be  his  wife,  and  thatj 
therefore  her  doing    them  at  all  was    quite" 


ON  GUARD. 


19 


stretching  a  point  in  the  endeavour  to  do  right. 
It  had  not  been  in  the  compact,  and  still  sho 
had  done  it  once  and  would  do  it  a^ain,  not 
because  she  thought  that  it  was  her  duty,  but 
because  it  would  please  Stanley. 

She  was  very  ardently  desirous  of  pleasing 
Stanley — very  sweetly  anxious  to  render  her 
omrso  of  conduct  as  perfect  a  thing  in  his  eyes 
as  she  might  render  it  at  no  trifling  exercise  of 
self  restraint  But  all  the  giving  way,  all  the 
self-abnegation,  must  not  bo  on  her  side.  They 
both  had  their  prejudices.  That  they  had  them 
was  very  patent,  though  the  days  of  their  en- 
gagement \vere  yet  young;  and  if  sho  uprooted 
hers  immediately  and  utterly,  and  asked  no- 
thing in  return,  his  would  flourish  more  strong- 
ly than  before. 

Mr.  Villars  came  up  to  the  rectory  in  the 
evening  to  dinner;  and  Bella  did  her  best  to 
listen  with  understanding  and  interest  to  the 
long,  arduous  conversation  he  held  with  her 
uncle  relative  to  the  approaching  confirmation, 
and  the  fitness  of  the  various  candidates  for  it. 
Had  she  suffered  herself  to  form  a  decided 
opinion  that  was  antagonistic  to  one  of  Stan- 
ley's at  this  period,  she  (poor  sinner)  would 
have  felt  shocked  to  hear  one  human  being  de- 
ciding on  the  exact  measure  of  grace  that  God 
had  vouchsafed  to  another.  But  Stanley  was 
always  right— in  these  spiritual  matters  at  least 
— and  Stanley  seemed  to  do  it. 

"  I  have  a  great  mind,"  he  said,  "  not  to  suf- 
fer Mary  Jones  to  go  up  this  time.  She  is  far 
from  having  a  proper  appreciation  of  the  awful 
solemnity  of  the  responsibility  sho  is  about  to 
take  upon  herself." 

Mr.  Vane,  by  way  of  answer  to  this,  nodded, 
shook  his  head,  and  looked  wise. 

"  Do  you  say  that,  or  anything  liko  that,  to 
Mary  Jones  herself,  Stanley  ?"  Bella  asked. 

"  I  endeavour  to  make  her  comprehend  that 
same  thing  in  still  plainer  language,"  he  replied. 

"  Then.  I  wonder  at  her  wanting  to  go  up  at 
all,"  Bella  rejoined  quickly. 

"  Why? — tell  me  why  ?"  he  said  quietly ;  and 
Bella  knew  from  his  tone  that  she  would  get 
the  worst  of  it,  and  be  made  to  endure  the  mise- 
rable sinner's  sensations  freshly. 

"  Whyl  because,  according  to  your  teaching, 
her  sins  are  her  godfather's  and  godmother's 
affairs  now.  If  you  go  and  frighten  her  about 
the  '  awful  responsibility'  she  is  incurring  by 
taking  them  upon  herself,  I  wouldn't  be  mag- 
nanimous were  I  Mary  Jones,  but  I  would  just 
let  them  remain  my  godfather's  and  godmother's 
affairs  still." 

"  It's  a  subject  that  has  puzzled  graver  heads 
than  yours,  Bella,"  Mr.  Vane  remarked  senten- 
tiously. 

"  Bella  is  so  volatile,"  Mrs.  Vane  put  in  with 
a  blithe  tone,  and  a  blithe  smile.  She  hoped  to 
a-vert  the  reproof  that  sho  read  in  Mr.  Villars' 
face  from  the  head  of  Mr.  Villars'  betrothed. 

"  I  cannot  suppose  Bella  so  much  puzzled  by 
it  as  desirous  of  turning  the  subject  into  ridi- 
cule," Stanley  said  in  a  low  voice  that  only 
readied  Bella's  ears.  Then  she  felt  very  sorry 
for  having  wounded  him,  and  horribly  conscious 
that  it  was  not  in  her  to  avoid  wounding  him 
very  often,  since  he  was — as  he  was,  and  since 
she  was  only  Bella  Vane. 

The  time  in  the  drawing-room  alone  with  her 


aunt,  before  he  came  in,  deepened  her  penitence, 
It  is  depressing  to  sit  for  an  hour  on  a  Sunday 
evening  in  a  room  in  which  "good"  books  alone 
do  dwell,  with  an  old  lady  who  is  very  sleepy. 
Bella  was  one  whoso  heart  always  grow  fonder 
during  an  absence  that  "was  not  too  prolonged. 
She  softened  to  the  follies  of  others,  and  hard- 
ened t<*  her  own,  when  she  was  left  to  herself. 
So  now  she  had  come  to  the  conclusion  that  she 
had  been  wrong  and  flippant,  and  Stanley  long- 
suffering  and  tenderly  discreet,  by  the  time  of 
Stanley's  advent. 

She  made  room  for  him  to  come  and  take  his 
place  by  her  on  the  little  couch  sho  occupied, 
and  as  he  seated  himself  he  looked  so  liko  the 
Stanley  Villars  of  last  year's  London  drawing- 
rooms,  that  she  forgot  Mary  Jones  and  the  con- 
firmation, and  relapsed  abruptly  into  her  own 
bright,  unclouded  self. 

"  Stanley,  I  want  your  advice  about  a  pair  of 
ponies  I'm  going  to  buy." 

"  Indeed !  well,  Bella,  I  shall  bo  very  happy 
to  give  it." 

"  I  have  promised  to  be  in  town  three  weeks 
with  mamma  in  August,  you  know."  It  was 
the  first  mention  Stanley  Villars  had  heard  of 
this  plan,  and  Bella  blushed  rather  consciously 
as  she  said  it. 

"I  thought  you  had  done  with  London  for 
this  season,  Bella." 

"  No,  not  quite ;  and  why  should  I  ?" 

"  "Why  you  should  is  not  the  point  in  ques- 
tion. I  understood  from  you,  when  you  eame 
down  here  first,  that  you  had  done  with  it." 

"  Something  has  occurred  to  alter  my  plans — 
not  so  much  mine  as  mamma's,  Stanley.     You 
wouldn't  have  mo  object  to  go  back  to  my  own  ' 
mother  ?" 

"  Certainly  not ;  but  why  must  your  own 
mother  drag  you  back  at  the  fag-cud  of  the 
season?" 

"It  suits  her  to  do  so,  I  suppose,"  Miss  Vane 
returned  promptly. 

"  And  it  suits  you  to  go,  Bella,"  he  said 
gravely.  The  thought  was  a  grave  one  to  him, 
that  his  future  bride  should  contemplate  a-  re- 
turn to  the  pomps  and  vanities  with  pleasure. 

"  And  does  that  seem  a  reprehensible  thing 
on  my  part? — really,  Stanley  1" 

Miss  Vane  said  "  Really,  Stanley,"  in  the 
partly  aggrieved,  partly  indignant  tone  women 
invariably  adopt  when  they  feel  a  little  guilty, 
and  more  than  a  little  injured. 

"  Not  a  reprehensible  thing ;  still  it  is  a 
thing  that  I  could  wish  was  not  going  to  be." 

"You're  not  afraid  to  trust  me,  Stanley?" 
she  asked  tenderly. 

"Honestly,  no!"  he  replied.  "No,  no, 
Bella ;  were  I  afraid  to  trust  you,  as  you  call 
it,  I  would  release  you  at  once." 

"  What  are  you  afraid  of  then  ?" 

"  Of  nothing.  I  simply  do  not  think  it  wise 
on  the  part  of  your  mother  to  immerse  you 
again  in  that  vortex ;  your  lines  are  to  be  cast 
in  such  widely  different  places,  dear." 

"  You  don't  grudge  me  three  weeks'  pleasure, 
do  you  ?"  she  said,  with-  a  warm  flush  mantling 
her  face  as  she  spoke. 

"  God  knows  I  do  not ;  but  if  this  will  be 
such  a.  pleasure  to  you,  what  will  the  rest  of 
your  life  be?" 

"Dull  enough,"  she  cried  impatiently,  "if 


20 


ON  GUARD. 


these  last  few  days  are  to  be  taken  as  a  sample 
of  it." 

She  paused  for  a  few  moments,  and  when  she 
resumed  it  was  in  a  much  softer  key. 

"Stanley!  I  didn't  mean  that — I  didn't  in- 
deed !  Only  why  will  you  try  to  make  me  think 
you  saturnine  and  grimly  good  ?  I  will  try  to 
come  right  by  degrees."  « 

"Dull  enough! — those  were  bitter  words, 
Bella,  if  you  did  mean  them — if  they  were  the 
expression  of  your-  genuine  sentiments,  Heaven 
help  me!  for  I  shall  need  its  help." 

She  saw  that  he  was  deeply  hurt ;  and  that 
he  loved  her,  truly  loved  her,  she  read  it  clearly 
then ;  and  an  uneasy  feeling  took  possession  of 
her  on  the  spot.  Supposing  that  frequent 
bursts  of  that  grim  goodness  from  which  she 
revolted  eventually  alienated  her  love !  what  of 
him  then  ? — would  she  not  have  a  terrible  thing 
to  answer  for  ? 

"  I  did  not  mean  it — how  could  I  have  meant 
it,  Stanley?  But  I  have  to  defend  myself 
against  so  many  small  charges,  it  seems,  now ; 
you  find  a  little  wrong  in  so  many  things  that 
I  do  and  want  to  do." 

"Can  you  only  hear  praise?" 

"  I  would  never  hear  anything  else  from  you, 
Stanley,"  she  said,  recovering  her  spirits  with  a 
little  effort;  "in  fact,  to  tell  the  truth,  the  idea 
of  being  blamed  until  I  was  married  never  en- 
tered into  my  head.  But  you  haven't  advised 
me  as  to  my  ponies.  I  could  get  a  charming 
pair — greys — dark  greys,  matched  to  a  hair, 
fourteen  hands  high,  for  two  hundred  pounds, 
but  they  have  only  been  driven  in  the  country, 
and  if  I  took  them  into  the  parks  I  might  dis- 
tinguish myself  unpleasantly." 

"  You  are  determined  on  a  pair.  Have  you 
heard  of  any  others  ?" 

"  Yes,  a  pair  of  chestnuts,  regular  park  po- 
nies, with  splendid  action,  that  I  could  have 
for  four  hundred  pounds.  Cheap,  isn't  it,  for 
they're  perfection  ?" 

"  I  should  take  the  greys,  I  think,  wero  I 
you.  Country  work  is  what  you  want  to  get 
out  of  them,  therefore  they  will  answer  your 
purpose  quite  as  well  as  the  chestnuts  that  you 
would  pay  two  hundred  pounds  more  for." 

"Oh,  as  for  price,  I  shouldn't  consider  that; 
only  I  like  the  greys,  so  I  am  undecided ;  but  I 
shall  want  them  for  town  work  too,  Stanley." 

He  looked  down  at  her,  at  the  great  beauty 
who  had  had  her  own  way  all  her  life,  and 
smiled. 

"I  should  be  very  sorry  to  see  you  driving  at 
pair  of  high  stepping  ponies  through  the  park* 
after  this  year,  Bella." 

"  We  shall  go  to  town  every  year,  shall  we 
not?"  she  cried,  eagerly. 

"Probably  we  shall." 

"Then  why  shouldn't  I  drive?" 

"  Bella,  ask  yourself.  Would  it  be  consist- 
ent ;  remember  I  am  a  minister  of  God ;  would 
it  be  consistent  ? — more  than  that,  would  it  be 
right  for  my  wife  to  make  herself  conspicuous 
in  such  a  way  ?" 

"  Stanley — I  can't  help  saying  it — I  think  it's 
accusing  God  of  possessing  very  petty  feeling  to 
fancy  He  can  care  what  His  ministers'  wives 
drive.  There,  I  dare  say  you  are  shocked ;  so 
am  I  at  your  narrow-mindedness." 

She  did  not  say  this  crossly  at  all.    She  said  it 


brightly,  but  earnestly  withal;  as  though  she 
thoroughly  meant  it  in  fact ;  and  Stanley  Vil- 
lars  was  shocked. 

The  evening — the  end  of  it  at  least — was  as 
miserable  as  that  morning  in  the  stuffy  school- 
room had  been.  She  was  glad  of  his  presence, 
for  she  loved  him  dearly  whenever  he  came 
down  and  was  of  the  earth  earthy.  But  still 
she  had  a  sense  of  restraint  in  that  presence ;  a 
feeling  of  being  in  the  wrong  place,  that  is  very 
antagonistic  to  love. 

If  he  would  only  have  been  interested  in  her 
proposed  ponies ;  if  he  would  only  have  seemed 
to  think  it  in  the  order  of  things  that  she  could 
drive  and  still  be  deserving.  But  he  could  not ; 
he  did  not ;  and  she  felt  that  he  never  would. 
Had  he  been  sympathetic  she  would  have  given 
up  so  much  that  was  pleasant  to  -her  now  right 
gladly.  But  she  could  not  give  up  anything 
when  the  sacrifice  was  evidently  expected  of 
her.  "With  what,"  she  asked  herself,  "would 
her  driving  through  the  park  be  inconsistent  ? 
Why  should  she  not  go  there  to  see  and  be 
seen?"  Oh!  her  engagement  began  to  weight 
her  horribly,  spite  of  her  love  for  the  man  to 
whom  she  was  engaged.  For  she  saw  him 
quick  to  carp  at  such  little  faults,  prompt  to  see 
such  tiny  specks  on  her'  brightness,  and  she 
wearied  over  the  prospect  of  having  to  urge 
something  in  extenuation  of  something  else'  so 
long  as  they  both  should  live. 

While  he  thought  that  she  would  require 
much  correction  both  at  God's  hand  and  his 
own  before  she  would  be  that  perfect  help 
mate  to  him  which  he  prayed  she  might  be 
eventually. 

She  spoke  no  more  of  her  ponies  that  night, 
She  only  sat  and  listened  quietly  while  he  re- 
commended a  new  style  of  dress  for  her  adop- 
tion when  she  went  to  the  Sunday  school. 

"Well,  Stanley,"  she  said  once,  " if  my  bon- 
net causes  a  weak  brother  to  stumble,  I'll  go  in 
my  hat  next  Sunday,  shall  I  ?" 

"If  I  believed  you  serious  I  would  argue 
with  you,  and  point  out  your  ,bad  taste,"  he 
replied. 

"It  would  be  bad  taste,  wouldn't  it?  It 
must  matter  so  much  above  whether  you  say 
your  prayers  in  a  bonnet  or  a  hat.  Don't  be 
frightened  though,  Stanley;  it  wouldn't  only 
be  fast,  but  it  would  be  bad  style  to  go  to 
church  in  a  hat." 

"  That  is  the  lowest  view  of  it." 

"Indeed,  I  think  you  are  mistaken,  now: 
there  is  nothing  low  in  avoiding  doing  a  bad 
style  of  thing.  Well,  Stanley,  there's  only  one 
weakness  I  will  stipulate  to  be  suffered  to  carry 
through;  let  me  take  a  Rimmel's  vaporiser  the 
next  time  I  rush  into  parochial  tuition." 

"  If  you  enter  into  it  in  that  spirit  you  had 
better  abstain  from  it  altogether,  Bella." 

"Then  you  would  think  me  a  pagan." 

"God  forbid  that  I  should  ever  think  the 
woman  I  contemplated  marrying  a  pagan !" 

"You  wouldn't    contemplate  marrying  me 
after  you  once  thought  it,  I'm  thinking,"  she 
said  recklessly,  for  she  was  weary  of  essaying 
to  climb  to  .praiseworthiness,  and  of  eternally 
slipping  back  again  into  what  he  regarded  as  \ 
perdition.     She  was  sadly,  sadly  weary  of  it  V 
already,  and  she  could  not  help  remembering    i 
that  it  would  last  so  long. 


ON  GUARD. 


21 


"  You  wouldn't  think  of  marrying  rue  if  the 
possibility  of  my  being  a  pagan  in  reality  oc- 
curred to  you?"  she  repeated;  and  on  his  not 
answering  she  went  on,  "would  you?  would 
you?" 

' '  I  would  not.  But  why  do  you  utter  such 
idle  folly,  my  own  darling?  You  cannot  be 
conscious  of  the  grief  such  light  speeches  cause 
me,  though  I  know  that  they  are  not  serious." 

"Then  if  you  know  they  are  not  serious, 
why  do  you  let  them  cause  you  grief?  Don't 
be  so  abominably  severe,  Stanley.  It's  my 
habit,  and  the  habit  of  my  set,  to  say  many 
things  that  won't  stand  being  picked  to  pieces. 
I  have  not  the  slightest  doubt  but  that  my  flow 
of  spirits  will  decrease  as  much  as  even  you  can 
desire,  in  a  year  or  two." 

"Bella,  I  hardly  understand  your  humour; 
you  may  be  merely  trying  me,  or  you  may  be< 
uncertain  of  yourself;  which  it  is  I  do  not 
know ;  but,  remember,  for  every  idle  word  you 
will  have  -to  give  account." 

"  As  you're  so  fond  of  scriptural  quotations  in 
and  out  of  season,  perhaps  you'll  preface  your 
next  reproof  with  a  peculiarly  apt  one.  Would 
you  like  to  know  which  I  mean?" 

She  leant  forward,  laughing  now,  but  still  a 
little  flushed  and  angry ;  and  he  shook  his  head, 
and  looked  reproachfully  at  her. 

" '  I  speak  as  a  fool ! ' — those  are  the  words  I 
would  recommend  to  every  self-ordained  re- 
prover;" and  when  she  'said  that.  Stanley  Vil- 
lars felt  a  keen  pang  of  conviction  of  the  error 
he  had  made  in  asking  this  woman  to  be  his 
wife. 

"  I  must  see  you  to-morrow,  and  speak  seri- 
ously to  you  for  both  our  sakes,"  he  said,  almost 
sternly.  Then  Bella  shrugged  her  shoulders, 
and  replied  she  "  hoped  not  more  seriously  than 
he  had  been  speaking  to-night." 

He  went  away  shortly  after  this,  leaving  her 
bitterly  penitent  for  having  been  stung  into  the 
utterance  of  sharp  things,  but  still  feeling,  de- 
spite the  bitter  penitence,  that  all  the  fault  was 
not  on  her  side.  She  declared  him  to  be  harsh 
and  unbending,  and  obstinate  in  a  cool,  sensible 
way,  that  was  infinitely  aggravating.  It  did 
not  mend  matters  at  all  that  in  the  commence- 
ment of  the  dispute  she  had  been  wrong  and  he 
had  been  right.  He  had  gradually  shown  him- 
self to  be  harsh,  obstinate,  and  masterful ;  and 
though  Bella  was  sorry  for  what  she  had  said, 
she  could  not  forget  that  he  had  deserved  it. 

The  girl  went  to  her  bed  thoroughly  miserable 
that  night  for  the  first  time  in  her  life.  She  had 
never  been  thwarted  in  the  whole  course  of  her 
career,  and  here  now  this  man  arrogated  to 
himself  the  right  to  condemn  her  pursuance  of 
habits  that  were  harmless  in  themselves,  and 
that  had  become  essential  to  her  through  long 
indulgence  in  them.  Hitherto  her  most  flagrant 
derelictions  from  good  sense  had  been  regarded 
as  flashes  of  something  like  genius  by  admiring 
friends.  Now,  when  her  path  was  one  of  wis- 
dom in  comparison,  she  was  corrected  and 
checked,  and  made  to  feel  the  bit  at  every 
turn. 

"I  shall  feel  constrained  and  uncomfortable, 
and  aure^that  I  shall  not  be  free  to  do  as  I 
please  in  the  tiniest  matter  all  my  life,  if  he 
gees  on  like  this,"  she  said  to  herself,  with  hot 
tears  in  her  eyes,  and  a  tight  cord  round  her 


throat.  "I've  made  a  mistake — and  yet  I  love 
him  so !"  Thus  she  wailed  herself  off  to  sleep 
long  before  Stanley  Villars  thought  of  retiring 
to  rest  that  night.  He  stayed  up  considering 
what  he  ought  to  do  in  this  difficult  case  of 
Bella's,  and  resolving  to  be  very  "  gentle  and 
firm  with  her,  and  very  patient,  and  very  par- 
ticular." All  these  things  it  behoved  him  to  be 
with  her,  and  all  these  things  he  resolved  to  be. 
He  did  not  misjudge  her  as  she  fancied  he  did. 
He  neither  thought  her  very,  wicked  nor  very 
foolish.  He  only  thought  her  undisciplined ; 
and  he  resolved  (feeling  fully  capable  of  it)  to 
discipline  her.  In  truth,  he  would  have  guided 
her  well — for  he  dearly  loved  her — had  she  but 
given  herself  up  entirely  to  his  management ; 
but  his  hand  was  so  heavy,  and  she  had  been 
accustomed  to  "have  her  head." 


CHAPTER  VII. 

ADRIFT  IN   TILE  WORLD. 

THERE  are  many  more  agreeable  things  in  life 
than  a  row  and  a  reconciliation  between  a  pair 
of  people  who,  with  the  proverbially  keen  vision 
of  jealous  love,  are  quicker  to  see  one  another's 
faults  and  follies  than  is  the  rest  of  the  world. 
The  word  "  row"  may  scarcely  be  used  to 
describe  the — well,  I  will  call  it  "  the  little  ex- 
planatory scene" — that  took  place  between  the 
betrothed  lovers  on  the  Monday  morning.  But 
"  the  little  explanatory  scene"  was  as  painful 
to  them  both  as  any  row  could  have  been,  and 
the  reconciliation  that  followed  was  one  of 
those  fraught-with-fe'slmg  affairs  that  render 
one  lachrymose. 

They  had  each  been  impatient — they  had 
each  been  exacting — they  had  each,  in  fact, 
been  wrong.  They  told  each  other  this  over 
and  over  again.  Bella  made  her  recantation  of 
error  hearty  and  complete,  but  Stanley  made  a 
reservation :  he  "  had  been  impatient  and  ex- 
acting, yes;  but  wrong,  no ;  his  dear  Bella  must 
admit,  no!" 

His  dear  Bella  admitted  "  No ;"  his  dear  Bella, 
indeed,  was  in  that  frame  of  mind  when  all 
kinds  of  admissions  can  be  torn  from  the  breast. 
She  had  been  very  anxious  and  unhappy — of 
that  she  was  sure  ;  and  she  wanted  to  have  her 
anxiety  removed,  and  to  be  forgiven,  and  petted, 
and  made  happy  again.  She  was  not  at  all  par- 
ticular as  to  terms ;  she  was  ready  to  admit 
anything,  provided  moral  peace  and  sunshine 
were  hers  immediately  on  the  admission. 

So  there  was  reconciliation  full  and  complete 
between  these  young  people  who  had  been 
guilty  of  the  grand  mistake  of  binding  them- 
selves to  each  other ;  and  then  Mr.  Villars  re- 
marked that  "  while  they  were  on  the  subject, 
perhaps  he  had  better  mention  to  Bella  somo 
things  of  which  he  could  not  approve ;"  and 
Bella  put  her  hands  up  over  her  ears,  and 
pleaded  "not  to  be  told  them  yet,  till  she  felt 
stronger."  She  wished  the  disagreeable  subject 
to  be  put  away  into  the  background  altogether  ; 
while  it  could  be  avoided  it  should  be  avoided, 
she  was  determined. 

"  "We  have  had  dreary  talk  enough  for  one 
day,  Stanley.  No  one  ever  made  my  eyos  s« 


•22 


ON  GUARD. 


red  before ;  and  to  think  that  you  should  have 
done  it,  when  I  haven't  been  engaged  to  you  a 
month,  sir!  I  won't  hear  a  word  more  to  make 
me  sorry  to-day  at  any  rate.  Tell  me,  when  is 
your  friend  coming  ?" 

"  Claude  ?    Coming  to-day,  I  believe." 

"  He  will  be  too  tired  to  come  up  here  with 
you  this  evening,"  Bella  said,  suggestively. 

"  He's  not  a  girl,  to  be  knocked  up  by  a  short 
railway  journey ;  still  we  shall  not  come  up  to- 
night :  you  will  have  a  respite  from  my  society 
to-night,  Bella." 

"  That's  very  considerate  of  you,  upon  my 
word !"  she  said,  sarcastically.  "  When  you  get 
an  amusing  man  down  to  this  place  you  keep 
him  to  yourself,  and  pretend  to  make  a  merit 
of  it." 

He  got  up  and  walked  to  the  window,  and 
she  took  up  a  local  paper  and  abused  it  for  the 
badness  of  its  type  and  the  poverty  of  its  in- 
telligence. Presently  he  said,  without  turning 
round — 

"  You  didn't  see  Claude  in  London,  did  you  ?" 

"  Never  saw  him,  and  never  want  to  see  him; 
don't  trouble  yourself  to  bring  him  here." 

"What  a  thoroughly  feminine  speech,  Bella!" 

"  Well,  you  know  that  I  hate  being  here  of 
an  evening  without  you,  Stanley, "Bella  replied, 
somewhat  irrelevantly ;  and  when  she  said  that 
he  came  away  from  the  window,  and  relapsed 
from  stoicism  for  a  period. 

"  What  I  was  going  to  say  to  you  just  now," 
he  resumed,  "  was  that  at  one  time  Claude  was 
supposed  to  be  rather  sweet  on  Florry.  I  never 
thought  it  myself." 

"  Brothers  very  often  are  blind  in  such  cases. 
I  have  heard  that,  Stanley ;  and  also  that  Flo- 
rence was  rather  sweet  on  Claude  Walsingham. 
That  is  why  I  am  so  anxious  to  see  him,"  she 
continued  animatedly.  "And  when  he's  down 
here,  Stanley,  if  he  seems  likely  to  stay,  do  let 
me  ask  your  sister  to  come  to  me  ?" 

"Oh,  no  !"  he  replied,  shaking  his  head,  "oh, 
no !  I'll  have  nothing  of  that  kind." 

"  You  won't  have  me  ask  your  sister  to  stay 
with  me?"  she  interrupted,  and  her  head  went 
up  quickly — she  was  feeling  the  bit  again. 

"  Not  for  the  purpose  of  throwing  her  in  any 
man's  way ;  not  even  in  Claude's,  whom  I  love 
as  a  brother." 

"  You  might  give  a  helping  hand  towards 
turning  him  into  a  brother,  then,  I  think." 

"  No,  Bella ;  you  will  see  what  Florry  is  by- 
and-by,  and  then  you  will  understand  that  she 
is  not  to  be  hawked  about." 

"  And  who  on  earth  would  accuse  me  of  be- 
ing guilty  of  such  a  low  idea,  save  you  yourself, 
Stanley  ?"  she  asked,  indignantly.  She  felt  ag- 
grieved in  every  way.  She  had  fancied  that  in 
his  refusal  to  bring  this  bosom  friend  of  his  to 
see  her  at  once,  there  had  been  a  tinge,  the 
faintest  tinge,  of  jealousy ;  and  this  she  had 
desired  to  assuage  by  professing  a  warm  interest 
in,  and  a  desire  to  further,  the  attachment  which 
might  possibly  exist  between  Claude  and  Florry. 
This  being  the  case,  it  was  hard  to  be  found  guilty 
on  that  count  too.  To  be  had  up  and  repre- 
hended for  a  venial  error  against  good  taste, 
that  had  been  expressly  designed  to  cover  a 
suppositions  error  against  good  feeling!  It 
would  be  a  difficult  matter  to  please  Stanley 
when  the  time  came  for  her  "to  be  with  him 


always."  Bella  acknowledged  to  herself  with 
a  sigh  that  it  would  be  difficult — nay,  more 
than  that,  impossible. 

The  explanatory  scene  and  the  complete  re- 
conciliation drifted  oft'  into  mere  weariness  and 
dissatisfaction  again  after  this  trifling  misunder- 
standing respecting  Florry  and  Claude.  Bella 
affected  to  be  afraid  to  venture  upon  any  topic 
for  fear  of  alarming  Stanley's  sensitive  delicacy, 
and  Stanley  was  very  unaffectedly  annoyed 
with  her  for  professing  this  fear.  They  were 
neither  of  them — these  people  who  had  been 
engaged  for  life  for  the  space  of  one  month — 
very  sorry  when  the  hour  of  parting  came,  for 
they  felt  chary  of  saying  anything  more  to  each 
other. 

Bella  was  terribly  discomposed  for  the  re- 
mainder of  that  day.  "  Out  of  sorts,"  her 
ftunt  called  it,  and  her  aunt  pitied  her  accord- 
ingly— "  knowing  well  what  it  was,"  she  said ; 
but,  ah !  she  never  could  have  known  the  tenth 
part  of  "it,"  with  her  equable  temperament 
and  the  Rev.  Mr.  Vane. 

"  I  shall  have  Vengeance,  and  go  out  for  a 
long  ride,  and  give  Rock  a  run,"  Bella  said, 
when  the  dinner,  not  any  of  which  she  could 
eat,  was  nearly  over. 

"  Mr.  Villars  does  not  like  you  to  ride  out 
with  only  a  groom  at  night,  Bella,"  her  aunt 
protested. 

"  Then  Mr.  Villars  might  accompany  me  him- 
self, aunt." 

"  I  hardly  think  it  right  myself,"  Mrs.  Vane 
went  on,  more  humbly,  for  her  niece's  tone 
startled  her. 

"Oh,  nonsense!"  that  young  lady  replied, 
with  decision ;  "  I  shall  have  Rock — dear, 
honest,  faithful  Rock  with  me ;  and  though  he 
may  not  be  quite  so  prudent  as — as  some  people 
are,  he's  plucky,  and  that  is  more  to  the  purpose." 

It  was  about  half-past  six  in  the  evening 
when  Miss  Vane  started  for  her  ride.  The 
brown  mare  Vengeance  had  been  idle  for  seve- 
ral days,  and  she  consequently  was  full  of  corn 
and  courage.  She  came  up  champing  her  bit, 
and  curving  her  head  round,  and  striking  the 
ground  with  a  quick,  impatient  foot,  in  a  way 
that  was  very  pleasant  in  her  mistress's  eyes. 
Bella  liked  to  see  her  mare  full  of  play,  and 
scarcely  able  to  restrain  herself  before  she  was 
mounted.  She  always  went  off  in  an  inspirit- 
ing burst  when  that  was  the  case,  as  soon  as 
her  rider  was  seated,  that  left  dull  care  behind. 

Dull  care  commenced  retreating  as  soon  as 
Miss  Vane  saw  her  horse  this  evening.  "  She'll 
take  all  my  time  to-night,"  she  thought,  with 
some  of  the  triumphant  sensations  a  belief  in 
one's  ability  to  cope  with  the  animal  is  sure  to 
engender.  Rock,  too,  came  up  with  the  evident 
intention  of  making  things  as  pleasant  as  possi- 
ble by  accompanying  his  mistress.  In  fact, 
there  was  no  disappointment — no  falling  short 
of  her  hopes  of  them,  in  either  her  horse  or  dog. 

"  If  I  were  you  I  should  ride  along  the  high- 
road to  Burton  and  back,"  Mr.  Vane  suggested, 
when  his  niece  was  settled  in  her  saddle,  and 
had  gathered  up  her  reins.  The  suggestion 
awakened  the  spirit  of  contradiction  which 
Stanley  Villars  had  roused  in  her  in  the  morn- 
ing, and  she  replied — 

"  The  high-road  is  so  uninteresting.     I  shall    ] 
try  some  of  the  by-lanes." 


ON  GUARD. 


23 


So  she  went  off,  Vengeance  with  her  head 
well  up,  and  with  that  springing  quick  action 
that  speaks  of  restrained  impatience. 

Bella  eschewed  the  road  that  led  through  the 
village;  'that  road  would  have  taken  her  past 
Stanley  Villars'  house,  and  she  did  not  wish  to 
exhibit  herself  to  him  and  to  that  friend  of  his 
about  whom  she  had  been  unable  to  say  right 
things.  She  rode  away  in  a  contrary  direction, 
and  took  the  first  by-lane  that  she  came  to, 
"  because  it  looked  like  a  good  riding  road,"  she 
said  to  herself,  btit  in  reality  because  she  hoped 
she  might  miss  her  way  and  become  involved 
in  a  labyrinth  of  by-lanes,  and  so  be  compelled 
to  take  Vengeance  home  across  country. 

The  idea  of  doing  this  was  very  gratifying  to 
her  to-night.  She  half-fancied  that  Stanley 
would  not  quite  approve  of  her  doing  it  in  this 
neighbourhood  where  his  quiet  clerical  reputa- 
tion was  so  well  assured.  He  might,  perhaps, 
think  it  a  fast  and  uncalled-for  proceeding  on 
her  part,  that  she  should  ride  in  any  other  than 
an  orderly  and  sedate  manner  when  only  her 
groom  was  in  attendance.  Then,  if  he  expressed 
this  opinion,  she  could  tell  him  that  she  had 
been  driven  on  to  this  obnoxious  course  through 
having  nothing  to  do,  and  nothing  to  look  for- 
ward to  for  the  evening,  when  he,  of  course, 
would  be  penitent  both  for  his  neglect  and  for 
the  censure  he  had  passed,  and  all  would  be 
well  between  them  again. 

The  lane  she  had  taken  was  one  of  those 
"  flowery  conceits"  that  Nature  does  occasion- 
ally indulge  in,  even  in  prosaic  England.  It 
rambled  in  zig-zags  about  the  country,  it  lost 
itself  amongst  fields,  it  embowered  itself  be- 
tween lofty  overarching  hedges,  it  merged  im- 
perceptibly into  other  lanes,  it  completely 
achieved  Miss  Vane's  object,  in  fact,  for,  after 
riding  for  an  hour,  she  found  herself  she  knew 
not  where,  and  on  looking  back,  the  entrances 
to  many  lanes  gaped  around  her  on  every  side. 

She  had  attained  her  object ;  she  had  lost  her 
way,  and  her  groom's  powers  of  observation 
proved  to  be  of  no  exceptional  order.  He 
could  only  reiterate  her  assertion  as  to  the  way 
being  lost,  and  regret  that  it  should  be  so.  He 
could  bring  no  original  ideas  to  bear  upon  this 
subject. 

The  other  part  of  her  scheme  proved  imprac- 
ticable. The  part  of  the  country  in  which  she 
found  herself  was  not  to  be  "  crossed"  with  im- 
punity or  advantage,  or  at  all  even.  The 
hedges  rose  high  on  all  sides,  for  agriculture 
was  not  in  the  ascendant,  and  Vengeance  and 
Vengeance's  mistress,  though  they  would  have 
flown  anything  lightly  and  gaily  as  birds,  were 
not  equal  to  scrambling  through  apparently  im- 
penetrable masses  of  time-honoured  thorns. 

"  The  only  thing  to  be  done,  Hill,"  she  said, 
after  a  few  minutes'  conversation  with  her  man, 
whom  she  had  signalled  to  ride  up  to  her  side, 
"  the  only  thing  to  be  done  is  to  turn  round — 
we  must  b§  going  away  from  Denham  now — 
and  ride  straight  away  in  the  opposite  direction ; 
we  must  trust  to  the  mare's  instinct  whenever 
we  are  not  sure  (which  I  shall  never  be),  and  to 
Rock's." 

Now,  both  the  mare's  instinct  and  Rock's 
were  very  good  things  in  their  respective  ways, 
but  they  were  scarcely  equal  to  this  emergency. 
The  mare  was  skittish  and  evinced  a  desire  to 


take  every  turning  to  which  they  came,  and  on 
the  face  of  it,  it  was  utterly  impossible  that 
every  turning  could  be  right.  Rock  was  not 
skittish,  but  he  was  worse,  solemnly  depressed, 
in  fact,  as  if  he  felt  sorry  for  his  share  in  this 
transaction,  and  was  disposed  to  regard  himself 
and  his  mistress  as  wandering  sinners  who  had 
strayed  from  the  path  of  right,  and  who  were 
not,  under  the  existing  aspect  of  affairs,  at  all 
likely  to  get  back  again. 

Miss  Vane  had  been  excited — pleasurably 
excited,  nothing  more — when  she  first  made  the 
discovery  that  she  was  adrift  in  the  world. 
But  presently  she  began  to  feel  less  pleasurably 
excited,  and  by  degrees,  as  she  rode  on  and  on, 
and  found  no  landmarks  that  were  familiar  to 
her,  and  observed  the  signs  of  the  dissolution 
of  the  day  that  were  around  and  above  her,  she 
grew  unconditionally  uncomfortable. 

After  a  time  she  came  to  an  open  space,  a 
wild  sort  of'  common,  which  she  had  never  seen 
in  any  of  her  rides  before.  It  was  covered  with 
heath  and  gorse,  and,  arguing  from  analogy, 
she  decided  that  it  must  be  a  certain  Welling 
Heath  of  which  she  had  heard  frequent  men- 
tion made,  and  which,  to  the  best  of  her  know- 
ledge, was  situated  in  a  north-easterly  direction 
from  Denham. 

Once  more  she  summoned  her  groom  up  for 
the  purpose  of— not  so  much  "  consulting"  him, 
as  I  was  about  to  write,  as  of  declaring  her 
conviction  aloud  that  she  "knew  perfectly  well 
where  she  was."  "  If  this  is  Welling  Heath  we 
are  all  right,  not  more  than  ten  miles  from  Den- 
ham  Hill,  and  it  is  Welling  Heath  I  know." 

Hill,  still  suffering  from  a  paucity  of  original 
ideas  on  the  subject,  touched  his  hat  and  fell 
back  again,  and  Rock  relapsed  into  his  normal 
spirits,  and"  dashed  wildly  over  the  common 
after  a  rabbit. 

There  were  two  roads  on  the  opposite  side  of 
the  heath  to  that  on  which  Bella  had  come  upon 
it,  and  she,  without  much  deliberation,  took  one 
of  them  and  went  along  it  at  a  sharp  gallop, 
for,  lovely  July  evening  as  it  was,  it  was  palpa- 
bly getting  late. 

It  was  a  very  solitary  road ;  still  it  was  the 
turnpike  road,  and  the  hedges  on  either  side  of 
it  were  trimmed  down  in  a  way  that  permitted 
her  a  free  view  over  the  country  on  either  side, 
and  the  hope  was  father  to  the  thought  that  it 
"  looked  very  much  like  the  land  about  Denham." 
She  made  this  asseveration  to  herself  several 
times  as  she  galloped  on,  and  the  belief  in  her 
own  statement  grew  weak  in  exact  proportion 
to  the  increasing  determination  of  her  tones. 

A  finger-post  at  last !  She  pulled  up  close- 
to  it  as  suddenly  as  she  had  come  upon  it — 
pulled  up  so  abruptly  that  Vengeance  nearly  set- 
tled back  on  her  haunches.  The  girl  was  get- 
ting anxious  to  be  home,  for  the  road  was  very 
lonely,  and  the  day  was  dying  in  the  sky. 

By  its  last  grey  light  she  read  eagerly  the 
names  that  were  written  up  on  the  moss-grown 
old  finger-post.  They  were  names  of  places  of 
which  she  had  never  heard ;  they  were  names 
of  places  of  which  Hill  had  never  heard ;  and 
they  were  all  eight  or  ten  miles  off  it  seemed 
to  her,  as  well  as  she  could  decipher  the  figures. 
It  was  useless,  she  deemed,  to  turn  down  any  of 
the  roads  that  led  off  from  the  one  she  had  taken 
in  faith  when  on  the  common.  It  was  useless 


24 


ON  GUARD. 


to  pause  in  deliberation.  It  was  useless  to  do 
ai^thing  save  gallop  straight  ahead  as  hard  as 
Vengeance  could  lay  her  legs  to  the  ground. 

It  was  a  lonely  road.  I  have  said  that  about 
Denham  agriculture  was  not  in  the  ascendant, 
which  fact  was  patent  to  the  most  ignorant  in 
such  matters  who  caught  sight  of  the  high,  lux- 
uriant hedges.  But  here  they  were  cut  down 
and  kept  in  order,  and  were  in  all  respects  ut- 
terly devoid  of  the  characteristics  of  the  hedges 
around  Denham. 

"Surely  a  strange  part  of  the  country!" 
This  thought  would  obtrude  itself  upon  her 
mind,  but  she  put  it  behind  her  to  the  best  of  her 
ability  and  galloped  on,  straight  on,  with  her  heart 
beating  rather  more  quickly  than  even  that  pace 
warranted,  and  with  a  profound  conviction  that 
she  would  have  done  better  had  she  followed 
her  uncle's  advice  and  ridden  along  the  well- 
known  road  to  Burton. 

No  houses  yet ;  no  semblance  of  a  village  or 
inn.  or  of  the  merest  wayside  hovel  even.  For 
all  she  knew,  houses  full  of  people,  who  could 
have  guided  her  back  to  Denham  with  a  word, 
might  be  lurking  a  field  or  two  off  from 
this  road  that  was  innocent  of  human  habita- 
tion. But  it  would  have  been  neither  possible 
nor  pleasant  to  explore  unknown  corn  and  pas- 
ture lands,  and  the  increasing  darkness  pre- 
vented her  seeing  the  smoke  that  might  be 
rising  up  from  the  chimneys  of  the  probable 
houses. 

It  was  a  lonely  road ;  she  thought  that  she 
had  never  seen  so  lonely  a  one  as  she  pulled  up 
and  walked  the  mare  for  awhile,  for  fear  of 
overheating  her.  The  hedges  ran  along  still  un- 
broken save  by  the  gates  that  opened  into  quiet 
fields  full  of  ripe  corn,  and  the  moon  arose,  and 
the  stars  came  out,  and  there  was  a 'deep  peace 
over  all  things. 

No  danger  could  come  to  her,  she  felt  sure  of 
that,  let  the  road  be  lonely  as  it  would.  With 
her  trusty  groom  behind  her,  and  resolute  Rock 
by  her  side,  she  had  no  fear  of  midnight  marau- 
ders even  should  she  be  so  luckless  as  to  be 
roving  about  till  midnight.  But  unpleasantness 
might  and  surely  would  arise  from  this  unin- 
tentional escapade  of  hers. 

Those  who  have  ever  ridden  along  a  road  in 
pleasing  uncertainty  as  to  where  that  road  may 
lead  them,  and  who  are  accountable  to  anxious 
friends  for  their  outgoings  and  incomings,  and 
those  alone,  can  realise  the  sensations  which 
crowded  through  Miss  Vane's  mind  as  the  night 
and  the  road  went  on,  and  she  was  no  nearer 
Denham.  Looked  at  broadly,  no  harm  would 
be  done  even  were  she  compelled  to  ride  about 
all  night ;  her  horse  and  herself  would  both  be 
a  little  fatigued  probably,  but  fatigue  is  a  thing 
to  be  got  over.  But  she  could  not  look  at  it 
broadly  for  more  than  two  consecutive  minutes. 
She  could  not  help  remembering  that  there  were 
gome  things  which  could  not  be  got  over  so 
speedily  as  the  fatigue ;  and  amongst  these 
things  would  be  the  conventional  wonder  and 
reprobation  she  would  cause,  and  Stanley  Vil- 
lars'  annoyance  at  the  same.  She  thought  the 
subject  over  from  every  possible  point  of  view 
as  she  went  along  at  a  "  a  ready-for-anything" 
trot ;  and  when  she  had  exhausted  it  she  pulled 
up  again,  and  still  the  road  was  lonely. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

FOR  THE  FIEST  TIME. 

IT  was  not  a  hopeful  state  of  affairs.  The  mare 
was  flagging  in  a  way  that  told  Bella,  to  the 
full  as  much  as  her  own  fatigue,  that  she  had 
been  on  the  road  for  many  hours.  Vengeance 
was  like  a  good  many  ladies'  horses — her  pow- 
ers of  endurance  were  to  be  exhausted.  With 
her  horse  nearly  spent,  and  her  mind  heavy 
with  thoughts  of  "  what  would  be  said  about 
it,"  Bella  Vane  was  in  rather  a  pitiable  plight. 
The  entrance  to  a  village ;  better  still,  to  a 
town  I  She  came  upon  it  abruptly  in  the  night ; 
came  out  suddenly  from  a  lonely  country  road 
upon  masses  of  architecture  looming  high  above 
her;  came  out  at  the  foot  of  a  hill,  which  the 
flagging  mare  had  no  sooner  climbed,  than  Bella 
found  herself  between  rows  of  houses,  even  in 
a  paved  street. 

A  quiet  street,  with  but  few  signs  of  life  in 
it.  Darkness  dwelt  in  its  lower  windows  al- 
most without  an  exception  ;  but  a  few  of  the 
upper  chambers  were  still  illuminated  in  a  sober 
respectable  way  that  was  pleasant  to  behold — 
it  proved  to  her  that  all  the  world  was  not  gone 
to  bed. 

Her  groom  was  riding  nearly  abreast  of  her 
at  this  time,  and  noV  she  told  him  to  keep  a 
sharp  look-out  for  a  respectable  inn  with  signs 
of  life  in  it.  Miss  Vane  had  no  idea  as  to  what 
this  place  might  be  to  which  she  had  drifted ; 
she  only  saw  that  it  was  a  quiet  town,  and  a 
feeling  came  over  her  that  it  was  old  and  ex- 
tensive. 

A  wild  hope,  too,  shot  through  her  heart, 
that  she  might  have  been  riding  in  circles,  and 
that  so,  though  she  had  been  over  much  ground, 
she  might  still  not  be  so  far  from  Denham,  but 
that  the  sheltering  wall  of  its  rectory  might  be 
gained  by  her  that  night.  The  thought  of  the 
uproar  and  dismay  that  was  most  surely  reign- 
ing in  that-usually  quiet  old  house  smote  upon 
her  heart  painfully,  and  when  she  thought  about 
what  Stanley  must  be  feeling  and  thinking  of 
her,  she  could  hardly  keep  the  saddle. 

They  came  directly  upon  a  busier  part  of  the 
town,  a  part  that  was  broader  awake  than  the 
street  through  which  she  had  passed.  A  few 
fitful  and  uncertain  strains  from  a  brass  band, 
with  a  want  of  unity  of  purpose  in  it,  struck 
upon  her  ears.  Then  she  saw  a  well-lighted 
house,  with  a  red  lion  swinging  on  a  post  before 
it,  and  she  turned  into  the  yard  of  this  house 
with  a  feeling  of  relief. 

"Go  in,  or  ask  an  ostler  the  name  of  this 
place,  and  how  far  it  is  from  Denham,  and  hear 
if  I  can  hire  any  one  to  guide  me  back  there  at 
once,"  she  said  to  Hill,  as  she  pulled  up  in  a 
quaint  old  yard,  round  three  sides  and  a  half  of 
the  fourth  of  which  buildings  ran,  and  in  which 
a  stagnant  pool  in  the  centre  reposed  beneath  a 
weeping  willow. 

In  answer  to  her  inquiries,  an  ostler  camo 
forward,  and  told  her  that  the  town  was  the 
cathedral  town  of  the  county;  that  Denham 
was  seven-and-twenty  miles  distant ;  and  that 
the  hour  was  half-past  eleven.     Thus  she  learnt\ , 
that  she  had  been  riding  five  hours,  and  that  it'p 
was  out  of  the  question  to  expect  Vengeance 


ON  GUARD. 


25 


to  carry  her  home  to-night.  Additionally  she 
heard  that  her  arrival  there  was  inopportune, 
as  the  house  was  full  of  rifle  officers,  there  hav- 
ing been  a  volunteer  review  at  an  adjacent  park 
that  day. 

The  mistress  of  the  house,  hearing  a  rumour 
of  a  lady  in  distress  in  the  yard,  came  out  at 
this  juncture,  and  Bella  dismounted,  and  went 
in  to  rest  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour,  and  to  hear 
whether  she  could  have  a  carriage  and  be  taken 
home. 

The  broad  entrance,  that  was  more  than  a 
passage  and  less  than  a  hall,  became  alive  with 
men  in  grey  tunics  turned  up  with  red,  as  she 
passed  through  ;  for  the  gallant  officers  of  the 
Blankshire  Rifles  had  heard  the  rumour  of  her 
advent  in  distress,  as  well  as  the  landlady,  and 
forthwith  the  majority  of  them  made  missions 
across  from  one  to  another  of  the  many  rooms, 
in  order  to  see  her.  There  had  been  a  great 
dinner  at  the  "  Red  Lion  "  that  night,  and  the 
strains  of  their  own  baud,  together  with  the 
military  ardour  which  is  apt  to  fire  the  breasts 
of  worthy  country*  gentlemen  on  such  occasions, 
had  been  too  much  for  many  of  them. 

So  Bella— beautiful  Miss  Yane — was  com- 
pelled to  run  the  gauntlet  of  what  appeared  to 
her  most  impertinent,  presumptuous,  admiring 
observation.  She  felt  indignant  with  these 
men,  so  full  of  wine  and  insolence,  who  came 
out  and  gazed  at  her  daringly,  as  no  men  had 
ever  gazed  at  her  before.  In  her  well-dut  habit, 
and  the  hat  with  the  big  tulle  bow  behind,  she 
was  an  unexpected  apparition  at  that  hour  of 
the  night  unquestionably.  With  her  anger 
heightening  her  beauty,  she  passed  through 
them  to  a  quiet  room,  leaving  them  not  dumb 
with  amazement  at  her  charms,  but  chattering 
loudly  in  their  praise. 

Fate  was  against  her.  The  "  Red  Lion  "  kept 
neither  chariots  nor  horses,  and  the  two  rival 
hotels,  who  were  the  proud  possessors  of  post- 
horses,  demurred  about  obliging  a  guest  of  the 
"  Red  Lion's."  That  is  to  say,  though  they 
made  the  excuse  of  their  horses  having  been 
out  all  day  with  "  parties  "  at  the  review,  it 
"  was  jealousy  of  our  having  the  dinner  that  was 
at  the  bottom  of  the  refusal,"  the  hostess  of  the 
"  Red  Lion  "  told  Miss  Vane. 

"  What  am  I  to  do  ?  What  am  I  to  do  ?  " 
she  said,  appealingly,  in  her  despair.  "  My  mare 
has  been  going  stiff  for  the  last  hour.  I  shall 
spoil  her  if  I  take  her  out  again,  poor  thing ; 
and  I  will  get  home  to-night." 

The  landlady  having  nothing  to  say  herself, 
replied,  that  she  would  go  "  and  hear  what 
could  be  done." 

Bella  sat  disconsolately  in  the  dull  inn  parlour 
into  which  she  had  been  brought,  and  gazed 
round  at  all  things  with  a  feeling  of  distaste  and 
loathing.  The  parlours  of  old  country  inns, 
even  though  they  be  dubbed  "hotels"  to  suit 
the  modern  ear,  are  not  wont  to-  be  pleasant 
•  places.  There  was  a  certain  hardness  and  an- 
gularity about  the  table,  and  chairs,  and  the 
couch,  that  was  anti-pathetic  to  her ;  and  there 
were  thick  glasses  on  stems,  without  any  sparkle 
about  them,  on  the  sideboard,  that  were  odious 
to  behold. 

She  was  not  left  to  herself  long.  The  land- 
lady came  bad'  presently  with  a  proposition. 
Sho  had  been  mentioning  the  "young  lady's 


little  difficulty  to  some  of  the  gentlemen,"  she 
said  (Bella  winced  at  the  whole  county  hear- 
ing of  it),  "  and  one  of  them,  a  gentleman  who 
didn't  belong  to  our  corps,  but  who  had  come 
from  the  review  with  a  friend  of  his,  and  who 
had  his  own  horses,  said  he  would  drive  her 
home  if  she  was  bent  upon  going,  and  would 
permit  him  the  honour." 

Bella  was  not  given  to  calm  dispassionate 
thought.  Still  it  did  seem  to  her  that  there  was 
something  out  of  the  way,  and  something  more 
than  slightly  unconventional,  in  this  proposed 
plan.  It  was  bad  enough  for  her  to  be  at  large 
in  the  world  in  the  night  in  this  way.  To  be 
at  large  in  the  night  with  a  strange  man,  on 
whom,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  she  could  not  have 
made  the  impression  of  being  rigid,  would  be 
worse  still. 

But  she  wanted  to  be  at  home.  "  Almost 
anything,"  she  told  herself,  "  would  be  better 
than  staying  here  in  this  horrid,  horrid  place, 
that  was  full  of  men,  free  to  roam  about  and 
look  at  her,  with  eyes  that  were  bloodshot  from 
much  wine,  when  she  moved  from  her  present 
seclusion.  It  was  a  painful  position  in  which 
to  be  placed,  and  her  having  placed  herself  in 
it  unaided,  did  not  make  it  one  whit  the  less 
painful.  The  landlady  took  a  motherly,  patron- 
ising tone  towards  her,  too.  Altogether,  she 
could  not  bear  it,  it  was  too  much  for  her. 
There  would  be  ngthing  '  wrong '  in  being 
driven  home  by  this  strange  gentleman ;  and 
even  if  there  were,  the  commission  of  a  little 
further  wrong  in  order  to  make  things  right  the 
sooner,  would  surely  be  justifiable.'' 

"  Ask  the  gentleman  to  come  here  and  speak 
to  me ;  and  you  may  come  with  him,  please," 
she  added,  hastily. 

He  came  at  once,  the  landlady  hovering  be- 
hind him,  her  voluminous  robes  and  portly  per- 
son making  a  background  of  propriety  for  his 
figure.  There  was  an  element  of  romance  in 
the  affair  directly  he  appeared ;  Bella  could  not 
resist  recognising  that  there  was,  despite  her 
dissatisfaction  with  what  had  gone  before,  and 
her  dread  of  what  was  to  follow. 

"  You  have  been  kind  enough  to  say  that 
you  will  take  me  home,  away  from  this  place  at 
once,"  she  exclaimed,  rising  and  bowing  to  the 
tall,  fair  young  man  who  entered.  Then  he  bent 
low  before  her,  and  declared  that  he  regarded 
himself  as  being  singularly  fortunate  in  being 
there,  and  in  being  able  to  assist  her.  "  You 
may  have  heard  my  old  friend,  Stanley  Yillars, 
mention  my  name,  Miss  Yane,"  he  went  on ; 
"  I  am  Claude  Walsingham." 

"Oh,  dear!  then  I  dare  not  go  homB  with 
you,"  the  girl  cried  out,  candidly;  but  she 
quickly  made  him  feel  that  there  was  nothing 
derogatory  to  him  in  that  fear  she  had  ex- 
pressed, for  she  went  forward  to  him  with  ex- 
tended hand,  and  with  a  smile,  bright  as  one  of 
those  sun- gleams  that  flash  upon  us  in  the  boy- 
hood of  the  year,  on  her  face. 

"  What  did  you  think,  Major  Walsingham, 
when  you  heard  of  me  arriving  here  at  this 
hour?" 

"  I  thought  that  it  was  extremely  unfortunate 
that  you,  and  extremely  fortunate  that  I  should 
be  here ;  despite  that  declaration  of  fear  as  to 
going  home  with  me,  I  think  so  still." 

He  was  just  what  she  had  expected  him  to 


26 


ON  GUARD. 


be — tall,  and  manly,  and  chivalrously  deferen- 
tial. Bella  was  not  one  bit  disappointed  in 
Claude  Walsingham. 

Nor  he  in  her.  She  was  precisely  the  great 
beauty — the  thoughtless,  careless  girl — utterly 
unsuited  to  his  friend  Stanley,  whom  he  had 
anticipated  meeting.  He  was  not  at  all  disap- 
pointed in  her,  and  he  could  not  help  remark- 
ing, as  she  took  off  her  hat,  and  lent  her  head 
against  the  back  of  the  couch,  how  far  fresher 
and  more  brilliant  and  blooming  she  was 
than  the  woman  who  had  looked  down  into 
the  water  with  him  the  other  night  at  Rich- 
mond. 

"  I  hardly  know  what  to  do,  Major  Walsing- 
ham ;  you  see,  if  I  stay  here  there  will  be  talk 
and  anxiety,  and  if  I  go  home  with  you  there 
will  be  the  same ;  I  think  you  shall  decide,"  she 
continued :  "  they  will  be  annoyed  at  Denham 
at  whatever  I  may  elect  to  do,  but  your  decision 
will  be  more  respected." 

She  was  in  the  habit  of  throwing  the  onus  on 
to  another's  shoulders  whenever  she  could.  She 
did  it  now  without  scruple. 

Claude  Walsingham  saw  in  an  instant  why 
she  had  hesitated  about  accompanying  him 
when  first  she  had  heard  his  name.  He  read  in 
that  hesitation  a  little  fear  of  Stanley  Yillars. 
"  Can  he  have  developed  jealousy,  or  is  she  act- 
ing ?"  he  asked  himself.  Then  he  looked  at  the 
bright  beauty  again,  and  was  fain  to  confess 
that  she  acted  very  prettily. 

"  It  seems  to  me  that  of  two  evils  you  will  be 
well  justified  in  choosing  the  lesser,"  he  said; 
"  I  would-  not  be  the  cause  of  your  giving  a 
moment's  annoyance  at  Denham." 

"  We  must  come  to  some  conclusion  quickly 
which  is  the  lesser  evil,"  she  said. 

He  paused  thoughtfully  for  a  moment,  and 
during  that  pause  he  reflected  that  his  first  pro- 
position was  an  impracticable  one.  Miss  Vane 
was  right ;  she  must  not  be  driven  home  by  him 
that  night. 

"  I  will  tell  you  what  I  will  do,"  he  exclaim- 
ed, "  you  must  remain  here,  Miss  Vane,  and  I 
will  go  over  to  Denham  and  tell  them  where 
you  are,  and  assuage  their  anxiety.  It  will  not 
be  pleasant  for  you  to  remain  here,  but  there  is 
nothing  else  for  it." 

She  looked  up  to  him  and  blushed. 

"  Let  my  groom  go,  or  send  some  one  else. 
Don't  you  leave  me  here,  Major  Walsingham." 

"  But,  Miss  Yane " 

"  But,  Major  Walsingham,  I  know  as  well  as 
possible  what  you  are  going  to  say — that  I 
ought  to  go  to  bed  and  sleep  the  sleep  of  the 
just  while  you  scour  the  country  in  search  of 
my  agonised  friends.  Well,  I  shouldn't  do  it. 
I  should  sit  here  all  night,  and  be  worn  out 
with  sorrow  and  remorse — don't  laugh;  I 
should.  If  you  will  send  to  Denham,  and  let  me 
have  the  knowledge  that  I  have  a  friend  in  the 
house,  I  will  go  off  quietly  to  one  of  their  dor- 
mitories ;  but  not  else." 

What  could  he  do?  She  had  held  out  her 
hand  to  him  when  she  had  asked  him  to  let  her 
have  the  knowledge  that  she  had  a  friend  in 
the  house.  He  could  but  take  the  hand  and 
promise  to  stay,  and  feel  her  to  be  .a  flirt. 

"  I  will  send  off  your  man  at  once  on  one  of  . 
my  own  horses,"  he  said  to  her;   "  he  will  be 
able  to  tell  them  how  it  came  about  better  than 


a  stranger,  and  I  will  stay  here  myself,  as  you 
desire  it,  Miss  Yane." 

So  he  went  off  and  despatched  the  groom, 
and  lingered  about  in  the  stables,  looking  at  her 
horses  and  his  own,  for  a  few  minutes,  half 
hoping  that  Miss  Yane  would  retire  without 
waiting  to  bit  him  a  last  good-night. 

He  told  himself  while  lingering  there  that, 
this  Bella  Yane  was  a  strange  kind  of  girl 
to  be  the  bride  elect  of  Stanley  Yillars  ;  but  at 
the  same  time  he  felt  that  she  was  a  very  sweet 
kind  of  girl — sweet,  and  remarkably  pretty,  and 
with  animation  enough  about  her  to  keep  any 
man  alive. 

She  sat  meanwhile  awaiting  his  return 
rather  impatiently.  There  was  no  occasion  for 
her  to  remain  there  till  he  came  back,  she  knew 
that  very  well ;  but  she  argued  that  it  would  be 
more  polite  to  do  it,  and  Bella  could  not  be 
guilty  of  an  impoliteness.  So  it  came  to  pass 
that  his  lingering  was  of  no  avail.  When  he 
came  back,  hoping  to  find  the  room  vacant, 
Miss  Yane  sat  there  in  unclouded  brightness, 
without  a  trace  of  fatigue  in 'face  or  manner, 
ready  to  receive  him. 

"What  an  extraordinary  thing  it  is  that  we 
should  have  met  here !  Why  are  you  not  at 
Denham  to-night,  Major  Walsingham — Stanley 
fully  expected  you?" 

''  The  colonel  of  our  regiment  came  down  to 
review  these  volunteer  fellows  at  Rollerscourt 
Park  to-day ;  he  induced  me  to  see  him  through 
it  and  the  dinner  that  was  to  follow.  I  had  my 
trap  and  horses  sent  on  here,  and  I  meant  to 
drive  over  to  Denham  to-morrow  morning." 

"How  very  odd  that  I  should  have  come 
here  of  all  places  in  the  world,"  she  said  medi- 
tatively ;  "  it  looks  like  fate,  does  it  not?" 

She  coloured  as  she  asked  it,  and  he  grew 
red  on  the  brow  as  he  laughed  and  replied — 

"  It  does.  Pate  has  been  kind  to  me  for  the 
first  time." 

"  I  ought  not  to  sit  up  here  talking,  ought 
I  ?"  she  asked  abruptly. 

"  You  ought  not,  indeed,"  he  replied. 

"  The  thought  of  going  away  to  one  of  their 
wretched  rooms  makes  one  shiver,"  and  she 
shivered  accordingly,  imparting  a  rippling  mo- 
tion to  her  lithe  form  that  was  pleasing  to  look 
upon,  and  that  was  as  far  as  anything  well 
could  be  from  representing  either  nervousness 
or  cold. 

"Nevertheless,  you  had  better  go.  Really, 
Miss  Yane,  you  will  be  quite  knocked  up  to- 
morrow. As  your  self-constituted  guardian, 
for  this  night  only,  I  will  order  you  off  at 
once." 

"  For  this  night  only,"  she  repeated  after  him, 
in  low  soft  tones.  "  Well,  it's  nice  to  be  plea- 
santly controlled  even  for  a  few  hours.  Good 
night,  Major  Walsingham." 

"  Good  night,"  he  said ;  and  then  he  touched 
her  hand  for  the  second  time  that  night,  and 
touched  it  .more.coldly  than  he  had  done  at  first. 
Pier  tones  were  very  soft  and  low  and  sweet, 
and  her  face  was  very  lovely ;  but — he  had 
been  in  Canada  when  she  flashed  out  free,  and 
now  she  was  engaged  to  his  old  friend,  Stanley 
Yillars. 

For  some  reason  that  it  may  be  as  well  not          \ 
to  analyse  too  closely,  Bella  said  her  prayers 
very  devoutly  that  night.     She  felt  humble  and 


ON  GUARD. 


penitent  as  soon  as  she  was  away  from  the  in- 
fluence of  Claude  "Walsingham's  presence.  She 
collected  all  her  tenderest  memories  of  Stanley, 
and  in  the  innermost  chamber  of  her  heart  felt 
guilty  of  having  done  something  that  might 
justly  call  forth  his  anger.  "What  this  thing— 
this  possible  wrong — might  be,  she  could  not 
decide.  It  was  not  that  she  had  lost  her  way ; 
she  had  been  innocent  of  intending  that  great 
offence  against  decorum.  She  began  to  have  a 
glimmering  notion  that  it  was  because  she  had 
come  to  the  "Red  Lion"  and  found  Claude 
Walsingham  there. 

"  It  will  be  very  unjust  of  Stanley  if  he  is 
annoyed  with  me  about  it,"  she  said  to  herself, 
as  she  went  from  one  end  of  her  room  to  the 
other  with  an  impatient  step.  "I  have  suffered 
quite  enough;  it  will  be  horribly  unjust,  it  will 
be  a  shame  if  Stanley  says  a  word  to  me  about 
it."  Then  she  stopped  in  her  walk,  telling  her- 
self that  he  had  no  right  to  utter  words  to  her 
that  would  give  her  pain,  and  that  she  was  very 
foolish  to  dwell  so  much  on  what  Stanley  might 
think  and  say  on  every  occasion.  "  A  woman 
may  so  soon  subside  into  a  mere  slave  if  she 
strives  to  trim  her  sails  to  every  breath  of  wind ; 
he  would  not  cease  for  an  hour  from  one  of  his 
soul-wearying  pursuits  the  other  day  to  please 
me." 

This  she  said  some  little  time  after  the  de- 
voutly-uttered prayers:  their  humbling  in- 
fluence had  begun  to  wear  off  already. 

Circe's  indescribable  charm  began  to  wane  in 
Claude's  mind  as  he  recalled  the  form,  the  man- 
ner, and  the  face  of  the  girl  his  friend  was  go- 
ing to  marry.  He  told  himself  that  Adele  and 
Miss  Yane  could  never,  under  any  circumstan- 
ces, be  friends,  and  that  the  impossibility  of 
friendship  existing  between  the  women  would 
cause  a  gulf  between  Stanley  and  himself.  "I 
should  be  sorry  for  that,  I  should  be  devilish 
sorry  for  a  coolness  to  come  between  us,"  he 
thought;  and  then  ho,  too,  busied  himself  (just 
as  Bella  was  doing  above)  in  recalling  all  his 
kindest,  warmest  memories  of  Stanley  Yillars. 
He  said  to  himself  that  the  latter  was  so  true 
a  man,  so  thorough  a  gentleman,  so  worthy  in 
all  respects  of  the  best  a  woman  or  man  could 
give  him  of  love  and  regard.  In  addition,  he 
reminded  himself  that  Stanley  was  Florence 
Villars'  favourite  brother — his  own  old  familiar 
friend.  But  the  end  of  all  his  recollections  that 
night  was,  that  Bella  Yane  would  be  there  with 
him  in  the  morning,  and  that  Bella  Yane  was 
engaged !  His  blood  leapt  through  his  veins  as 
he  thought  of  her;  but  "that  will  pass,"  he 
said ;  "  she  is  just  a  woman  to  strike  a  man  off 
his  balance  when  he  sees  her  for  the  first  time." 


CHAPTER  IX. 

WAITING. 

MR.  STANLEY  YILLARS  was  not  of  the  impatient 
order  of  mankind.  He  was  not  one  to  hear  in 
the  rustle  of  every  leaf  the  footstep  of  the 
coming  man,  or  to  find  the  minutes  hours  after 
the  time  had  passed  when  the  expected  one 
should  have  appeared.  But  for  all  that  patience 
and  perfection  of  judgment  as  to  time,  Mr.  Yil- 


lars did  wonder  more  than  a  little  why  Clauds 
Walsingham  was  so  late. 

It  has  been  seen  that  Mr.  Yillars  definitely 
refused  the  proposal  of  his  affianced  bride  as  to 
the  disposition  of  his  evening  hours  on  this  day, 
with  the  events  of  which  my  story  is  now  deal- 
ing. He  had  told  Miss  Yane  distinctly  that  he 
should  not  go  up  to  the  rectory  that  night ; 
therefore  he  would  not  go  up ;  though  Claude's 
non-appearance  by  the  last  train  that  stopped 
at  Denham — the  nine  o'clock  one — removed  the 
just  cause  for  that  abstinence  from  her  presence 
against  which  Miss  Yane  was  girding  in,  her 
heart. 

The  just  cause  and  impediment  which  had 
hitherto  existed  (in  his  own  mind  only,  be  it 
remarked)  was  removed,  and  still  he  would 
not  go  up  to  the  Yanes,  and  assist  in  making 
the  hours  pleasant  to  the  Yanes'  niece.  Still  he 
sat  in  his  own  study  in  his  bachelor  quarters, 
and  perused  reviews  with  a  lax  interest,  and 
smoked  a  cigar  in  a  desultory  manner,  and 
waited,  not  for  the  "  coming  man,"  the  time  was 
past  for  his  advent,  but  for  the  coming  darkness 
which  should  oblige  him  to  light  his  lamp  and 
do  something. 

It  came  at  last,  and  with  it  his  page,  who 
opened  the  windows  wider,  and  drew  the  cur- 
tains over  them,  and  placed  the  lighted  lamp  on 
his  writing-table  with  a  quick,  deft  hand.  Then 
he  departed,  and  Mr.  Yillars  fell  to  work  at 
once,  covering  slips  of  paper  with  strong, 
steady,  regular  characters,  writing  with  a  speed 
iv  which  there  was  no  hurry,  and  with  an  ab- 
sence of  hesitation  in  which  there  was  no 
thoughtlessness:  writing,  in  fact,  as  one  who 
has  ideas  of  his  own  on  any  subject,  and  words 
at  command  to  express  them  in,  would  write. 

Stanley  Yillars  was  in  capital  working  order 
that  night.  He  was  not  one  to  require  adven- 
titious aids  to  enable  him  to  pour  forth  his 
sentiments  on  paper.  They  poured  themselves 
out,  unassisted,  freely,  but  not  too  fast.  In- 
deed, there  was  no  occasion  for  them  to  come 
out  with  a  rush  and  tumult,  for  all  that  Stanley 
Yillars  did  was  of  his  own  free  will,  and  at  his 
own  gentlemanlike  leisure.  He  was  an  unpaid 
attache  to  the  staff  of  two  or  three  journals  of 
too  elevated  a  character  to  make  money  a  con- 
sideration with  their  contributors.  His  censure, 
and  praise,  and  summary  of  the  majority  of 
occurrences,  were  not  to  be  had  for  filthy 
lucre. 

Bella  had  no  idea  that  her  lover  dabbled 
even  thus  delicately  in  literature.  He  had  been 
very  merciful  to  her,  and  had  spared  her  this 
truth;  for  he  knew  that  were  she  once  cog- 
nisant of  this  fact,  she  would  imagine  that  it 
behoved  her  to  read  what  he  wrote — a  proceed- 
ing which  would  surely  be  puzzling,  and  most 
probably  be  painful  to  her.  He  intended  that 
it  should  dawn  upon  her  by  degrees,  when  cus- 
tom would  render  her  careless  of  his  printed 
words  of  wisdom  to  the  degree  of  not  insisting 
upon  distressing  herself  by  perusing  them. 

There  was  no  rush,  no  hurry,  no  false  excite- 
ment about  the  circumstances  under  which 
Stanley  Yillars'  papers  (he  always  called  them 
"  papers,"  not  articles)  were  written.  Shall  it 
be  added  that  there  was  no  rush,  hurry,  false 
excitement,  or  "go,"  about  the  papers  them- 
selves? They  were  sombre  things — "massive, 


28 


ON  GUARD. 


closely-reasoning"  things,  his  friends  said — 
things  that  their  producer  felt  a  respect  for  him- 
self, they  were  so  very  weighty.  He  was  not 
the  kind  of  man  we  are  accustomed  to  conjure 
up 'before  our  minds  when  we  speak  or  are 
spoken  to  about  a  journalist.  He  prepared  his 
copy  in  the  midst  of  calmness  and  comfort, 
never  winding  up  abruptly  because  a  diminu- 
tive "devil,"  with  eager  eyes  and  a  dirty  face, 
was  clamouring  vicariously  for  that  which  was 
not  ready.  The  bloom  was  on  literature  still 
to  this  gentleman,  as  far  as  he  himself  was 
actually  concerned.  He  knew  that  bad  hours 
and  much  brandy,  and  finally  being  broken 
down,  made  up  the  life-histories  of  too  many 
press  men,  and  of  too  many,  alas !  who  are  not 
mere  press  men.  But  these  things  had  never 
come  near  him.  He  looked  upon  them  from 
afar  with  a  sorrow  that  was  strongly  dashed 
with  contempt.  He  could  not  understand  how 
it  came  to  pass  that  men  of  a  high  order  of  in- 
tellect could  degrade  themselves  to  the  degree 
of  pouring  out  unconsidered,  careless,  faulty 
work.  Nor  could  he  feel  gently  towards  them 
for  seeking  inspiration — more  than  that,  even 
physical  power  at  times — from  ignoble  sources, 
to  enable  them  to  get  through  with  that  which 
was  to  them  existence,  and  would  be  vended  to 
the  world  at  a  penny  on  tho  following  morning. 
.  He  was  in  admirable  working  order :  it  came 
out.  that  which  he  had  to  say,  without  effort, 
as  it  is  apt  to  come  ou^  when  commercial  occa- 
sion for  it  is  lacking,  wad  it  feels  itself  to  be  the 
offspring  of  its  parent's  tree  will.  Stanley  Vil- 
lars  did  not  live  in  an  atmosphere  of  gas  and 
excitement,  about  things  that  appear  to  be  vital 
only  in  the  light  ot  the  same.  He  knew  no- 
thing of  the  strain,  and  so  rather  looked  down 
upon  the  signs  of  it  when  he  found  them — 
which  he  did,  not  infrequently. 

In  his  prosperity — for  all  things  are  relative, 
<uid  Stanley  Villars  had  no  tastes  and  no 
temptations  to  lead  him  to  exceed  that  income 
which  made  him  appear  a  prosperous  man  at 
"Denham — and  happiness,  Mr.  Yillars  was  ra- 
ther bard  in  his  judgment  on  those  who  made 
literature  their  trade.  It  came  under  the  head 
of  fraudulent  transactions  in  his  mind  that  the 
literate  few  who  represent  public  opinion  should 
pander  to  the  illiterate  many,  even  in  trifles. 
He  was  intolerant  to  long  laments  over  that 
which  was  not  remarkably  lamentable,  and  to 
a  column  and  a  half  of  virtuous  indignation, 
meant  expressly  for  the  perusal  of  the  people, 
about  the  vices  of  the  upper  ten  thousand.  In 
abort,  he  was  not  lenient  to  those  who  leant  to 
the  times,  and  strove  to  make  the  times  sup- 
port them.  He  was  very  hard  on  the  hot 
phrases  about  nothing  that  men  penned  at 
night,  because  they  were  compelled  to  pen 
something.  He  was  very  hard  on  the  careers 
they  ran ;  and  held  that  the  course  they  pur- 
sued, when  none  other  was  open  to  them,  was 
damning  evidence  of  their  incapacity  for  that 
position  in  journalistic  literature  which  forced 
them  to  pursue  it. 

So  he  sat  there  till  eleven  o'clock,  comfort- 
ably penning  his  exalted  notions  by  the  light 
of  a  paraffin  lamp  and  a  brace  of  wax  candles. 

At  eleven  he  was  disturbed — just  as  he  was 
glancing  over  some  of  his  phrases,  and  uncon- 
sciously despising  those  who,  with  brilliant 


abilities,  would  not  give  themselves  "  time  "  to 
do  equally  well — by  a  message  from  the  recto- 
ry— ""Would  Mr.  Villars  go  up  at  once,  for 
Mrs.  Vane  was  very  anxious  about  Miss 
Bella?" 

He  went  up,  more  enthusiastically  than  he 
would  have  liked  any  of  them,  or  Bella  herself, 
to  suppose  he  would  have  gone,  even  on  her 
account,  and  found  dismay  presiding.  Mrs. 
Vane,  in  her  first  sentence,  pleaded  ardently 
for  his  opinion  as  to  the  cause  of  Bella's  non- 
appearance,  to  be  given  at  once,  as  she  had 
found  herself,  she  declared,  unable  to  form  a 
single  one — a  statement  she  immediately  pro- 
ceeded to  strengthen  by  avowing  her  fixed  and 
unalterable  conviction  that  Bella  had  done 
divers  irreconcilable  things,  all  more  or  less 
unpleasant.  "I  begged  her  not  to  go%ut  for 
a  ride  on  a  horse  at  that  hour — I  did,  indeed, 
Mr.  Villars."  She  went  on  as  if  the  desirability 
of  Bella  going  out  on  a  horse  for  something 
quite  the  reverse  of  a  ride,  or  going  for  a  ride 
on  something  quite  the  reverse  of  a  horse,  were 
painfully  before  her ;  "  but  she  would  go,  and 
now,  of  course,  something  dreadful  has  hap- 
pened ;  and  yet  I  feel  sure  that  there  is  nothing 
serious.  I  quite  believe  she  is  only  staying 
away  to  alarm  us." 

"  Bella  would  not  do  that,  Mrs.  Vane ;  she 
may  have  lost  her  way,  but  she  would  never 
stay  away  purposely  to  distress  us." 

"  More  likely  she  has  been  thrown  and 
hurt,"  Mrs.  Vane  replied,  with  the  tears  start- 
ing into  her  eyes;  and  when  she  made  that 
enlivening  suggestion  Stanley  Villars  winced. 
The  picture  of  Bella  injured — Bella  mangled — 
Bella  suffering  and  away  from  him,  that  Mrs. 
Vane's  words  conjured  up,  was  too  much  for 
him. 

It  was  useless  to  stay  up  at  the  rectory,  he 
felt  that  was  useless  as  well  as  trying  when  he 
had  been  there  about  an  hour.  They  did  but 
aggravate  his  anxiety  by  starting  innumerable 
theories  of  evil  that  might  have  befallen  her, 
and  he  was  powerless  to  assuage  theirs.  Be- 
sides, theirs  was  unpleasant  to  him,  as  being 
of  what  he  deemed  a  spurious  order.  He  could 
not  quite  realise  that  contradictory  surmises 
and  fuss  could  be  co-existent  with  heartfelt 
suspense. 

It  was  useless  to  remain  at  the  rectory.  It 
was  useless  to  mount  his  horse  and  scour  the 
country,  as  Mrs.  Vane  once  urgently  requested 
him  to  do.  Bella  had  ridden  out  of  Denham 
by  a  road  that  branched  off  at  the  distance  of 
half-a-mile  in  five  different  directions,  and  no 
one  could  tell  which  of  these  she  had  taken. 
He  was  anxious,  unhappy,  and  longing  to 
serve  and  see  her;  but  scouring  the  country 
was  not  the  way  to  do  either  more  efficaciously 
than  was  Mrs.  Vane's  plan  of  running  to  the 
gate  at  brief  intervals  and  calling  "  Bella  "  in 
a  loud,  firm  voice  that  was  carried  on  the  night 
air  for  at  least  ten  yards. 

He  went  back  to  his  own  house,  after  charg- 
ing them  to  send  for  him  on  the  first  sign  of 
her  approach,  and  instead  of  finding  the  house 
wrapped  in  slumber,  as  he  had  hoped,  he  found 
the  mistress  of  it,  together  with  his  own  boy, 
up,  eagerly  awaiting  tidings  of  Miss  Vane.     It      ^ 
irritated  him   to  be  compelled  to  answer  well-     • 
meaning  inquiries.     It  outraged  him  to  hear 


ON  GUARD. 


29 


the  good  woman  declare  that  she  should  not 
go  to  bed  till  something '  was  known.  The 
sound  of  Vengeance's  light  hoofs  was  the  sole 
sound  he  desired  that  night— the  night  of  his 
first  introduction  to  his  nerves. 

He  went  into  the  room  where  the  lamp  and 
candles  still  burnt  brightly,  and  he  turned  the 
former  lower,  and  put  the  latter  out,  and  sat 
down  miserably  to  wait  and  feel — to  write 
freely  and  think  forcibly  no  longer.  He  was 
miserably  anxious  about  this  beautiful  love  of 
his — this  bright  flower  who  had  been  so  well 
guarded  all  her  life — being  out  in  the  dim  night 
unattended,  save  by  her  groom.  All  his  love 
for  her  welled  up  in  that  hour,  and  he  began 
to  understand  that  the  man  who  goes  down 
under  a  cruel  wrong  may  be  a  trifle  higher  in 
the  scale  originally  than  the  beasts  that  perish. 
The  thought  arose  to  torture  him,  that  even 
at  this  moment  she  might  be  exposed  to  insult, 
injury,  danger!  and  then  the  well-arranged 
room  in  which  he  had  but  just  now  penned 
exalted  notions  became  a  very  hell  to  him,  and 
the  distant  creak  of  his  landlady's  boots,  as  she 
vigilantly  roamed  about,  caused  him  to  regard 
her  as  a  fiend  incarnate.  There  was  no  dis- 
traction to  be  gained  from  anything,  poor  fel- 
low, after  that.  He  sat  there  maddened  nearly 
by  the  stillness ;  maddened  a  little  more  by  the 
smallest  break ;  pitiably  alive  to  the  fact  that 
his  great  anxiety  was  capable  of  aggravation 
from  small  causes. 

That  creak  again?  "Who  does  not  know  what 
it  is  to  sit  in  a  room  alone,  and  hear  the  first 
sound  emanate  from  the  sole  that  is  going  to 
tread  one's  own  soul  into  an  abyss  of  nervous 
woe  from  which  there  is  no  rising  ?  It  com- 
mences in  an  insinuating  way,  especially  if  it 
be  overhead.  You  hear  a  pleading,  plaintive 
squeak,  that  appeals  to  you  piteously  to  listen 
to  what  is  to  come.  It  is  prolonged,  this  first 
sound,  and  then  just  as  it  seems  to  be  dying 
away,  animation  seizes  it,  and  it  changes  into 
the  creak  defiant,  and  the  producer  of  it  appears 
to  rock  upon  that  foot,  and  to  have  no  sense  of 
fatigue. 

Mr.  Yillars'  landlady,  in  common  with  the 
majority  of  wearers  of  creaking  boots,  was 
gifted  by  nature  with  that  order  of  head  fami- 
liarly described  as  one  that  "  would  never  save 
her  heels."  She  had  a  habit  of  making  the 
greatest  number  of  journeys  in  a  given  space 
that  arithmetic  could  calculate.  Afterthoughts 
incessantly  arose,  especially  on  this  night, 
which  involved  a  fresh  journey  of  a  yard  and 
a  half,  a  fresh  plaintive  squeak,  a  fresh  defiant 
creak,  and,  finally,  a  fresh  continuous  rocking, 
of  uncertain  duration.  She  was  one  of  those 
who  always  see  something  that  they  want  to 
"  go  and  get,"  and  whose  hands  have  the  ex- 
traordinary property  of  always  holding  some- 
thing that  they  want  to  "  go  and  put  down." 
And  in  the  stillness  of  this  hour  of  agony  all 
her  evolutions  grated  distinctly  on  the  ear  of 
the  man  who  was  waiting. 

By-and-by  she  elected  to  do  what  was  even 
harder  to  endure  than  her  habit  of  rocking  on 
the  foot  that  had  the  most  creak  in  it:  she  be- 
came "humbly  anxious,"  as  she  phrased  it,  and 
opened  the  door  of  his  room  to  ask  him  "  if  he 
had  heard  anything  yet."  Which  inquiry  caused 
him  to  do  what  he  had  broken  the  little  boys  of 


the  village  of  doing,  in  his  presence  at  any  rate, 
namely,  to  swear  in  a  soul-relieving  way.  But 
there  was  worse  to  follow ;  he  felt  persuaded 
that  she  would  close  the  door  with  a  hand  so 
sympathetically  hesitating  that  he  should  be  un- 
certain whether  or  not  the  latch  had  fastened 
itself  into  its  socket.  He  knew  that  there 
would  be  no  decisive  reassuring  "  click"  about 
a  door  drawn  to  by  that  woman's  hand  that 
night.  As  in  a  dream  he  saw  that  it  would  be 
gently,  deprecatingly,  feebly  done ;  and  what 
he  felt,  and  knew,  and  dreamt,  came  to  pass. 

It  was  no  use  reason  telling  him  that  he 
could  promptly  remedy  the  evil  by  walking  up 
and  banging  the  door  firmly.  There  was  no 
compensation,  in  this  course  that  was  open  to 
him,  for  those  moments  which  had  elapsed  from 
the  dawning  of  the  dread  that  she  would  do  it, 
to  the  death  of  the  half-hope  that  she  might 
not.  There  was  no  alleviation,  in  doing  that, 
for  the  way  his  brain  had  tingled,  and  something 
had  waltzed  rapidly  round  in  his  head  when  he 
saw  it  left  undone.  He  made  wine  his  friend 
that  night ;  and  when  it  showed  him  things  in 
a  less  sombre  hue  for  an  instant,  even  he  ac- 
knowledged that  men  might  get  to  regard  it  all 
too  kindly  without  being  by  nature  bad.  De- 
spairingly he  began  to  make  wine  his  friend  at 
about  the  same  moment  that  Bella,  in  her  de- 
solation, began  to  make  Claude  Walsingham 
hers. 


CHAPTER  X. 

SUNSTROKES. 

THE  morning  light  broke  pleasantly  through  tho 
diamond-paned  window  of  that  chamber  in  the 
old  inn  which  had  been  Miss  Vane's  resting- 
place — broke  in  with  the  sweet,  lazy  radiance 
we  look  for  when  we  wake  in  sultry  June ; 
and  the  sleeper  on  the  couch  aroused  herself  to 
meet  it ;  and  all  thoughts  of  the  errors  and 
misgivings  of  the  last  night  were  obliterated 
from  her  mind  as  she  sprang  up  with  the  elasti- 
city that  was  the  offspring  of  complete  rest,  and 
a  feeling  that  the  day  was  very  young  and  fair, 
and  all  before  her  too,  and  that  life  was  the 
same. 

It  was  a  quaint  old  yard,  that  on  which  her 
window  opened.  Time's  hand  had  touched  it 
in  every  part  gently  but  perceptibly.  The  dark 
brown  bricks  of  the  building  (they  had  been 
red  long,  long  ago) — the  lichen  that  grew  in 
luxuriant  patches  about  the  same — the  solid, 
heavy,  iron-barred  doors  of  the  stables  and 
coach-houses — the  ivy-covered  porches  that 
jutted  out  from  two  of  the  entrances  to  the 
side  of  the  house  which  her  window  commanded 
— the  deep  air  of  quiet,  which  not  even  the  un- 
wonted presence  of  the  volunteers  could  dispel 
— all  these  made  up  a  picture  of  antiquity  that 
was  pleasant  as  the  bright  day  itself  to  look 
upon. 

It  was  a  quaint  old  scene.  It  made  the  es- 
sentially modern  young  lady  at  the  window 
feel  historically  romantic  as  she  gazed  upon  it. 
This  was  her  first  experience  of  an  old  English 
hostelry.  It  came  to  her  like  a  page  of  James 
or  Harrison  Ainsworth,  and  she  liked  the  idea 


ONT  GUARD. 


of  reading  more  of  it   in   Major  Walsingham's 
company. 

For  he  was  new  to  her  too,  though  he  was  a 
man  of  her  own  day  and  her  own  class.  Still 
he  was  new  to  her,  new  and  very  interesting — 
as  Stanley's  friend,  as  Florence's  possible  lover, 
of  course.-  How  kindly  he  had  come  to  her 
rescue  last  night  I  How  honestly  he  had  told 
her  what  she  ought  to  do !  How  pleasantly  he 
had  coerced  her  into  retiring  when  it  was  right 
she  should  retire,  though  by  doing  so  he  had 
defrauded  himself  of  an  agreeable  hour!  How 
handsome  he  was,  and  how  manly,  and  what  a 
charm  there  was  in  his  voice  I 

Her  thoughts  of  him  as  he  had  been  were 
interrupted  in  this  juncture  by  the  sight  of  him 
as  he  was.  He  had  come  out  into  the  yard 
with  two  or  three  officers,  and  she  heard  him — 
for  her  window  was  open  to  admit  the  warm 
young  morning  air — order  out  her  mare ;  and 
when  that  order  was  obeyed,  from  her  position 
behind  the  curtain  she  perceived  him  critically 
inspecting  Vengeance,  running  his  hand  down 
her  legs,  and  treating  her  pasterns  as  if  he  dis- 
trusted them. 

He  was  ready  to  receive  her  in  the  room  in 
which  they  had  met  the  previous  night,  when 
she  went  down :  and  he  greeted  her  with  the 
intelligence  that  her  troubles  would  be  shortly 
at  an  end.  The  carriage  had  arrived  from  Den- 
ham,  and  was  at  her  service — at  least,  not  un- 
conditionally at  her  service,  for  the  coachman 
had  orders  to  wait  a  couple  of  hours  to  rest 
his  horses  before  starting  on  the  homeward 
journey. 

"  I  mean  to  ride  home,"  she  said,  in  reply  to 
this  communication. 

"  But  that  is  impossible,  Miss  Yane " 

"  Not  at  all,"  she  interrupted ;  "  I  am  not  tired, 
thanks  to  your  prudence  in  sending  me  off  to 
bed  last  night."  She  delighted  in  giving  him 
credit  for  discretion,  even  to  her  own  heart  and 
himself  alone.  It  was  soothing  to  praise  him. 

"  Your  mare  is  tired,  though ;  and  not  alone 
tired,  but  lame,"  he  replied. 

"Poor  Vengeance,"  she  cried  earnestly,  "  she 
is  so  good ;  what  a  shame  of  me  to  have  ridden 
her  so  carelessly!" 

"  No  amount  of  care  would  have  been  of  any 
avail.  Vengeance  is  not  suited  for  these  country 
roads.  I  cannot  echo  your  declaration  that  she 
is  '  so  good.'  She  is  all  very  well  for  a  park 
hack,  but  she  is  a  terrible  screw." 

Bella  frowned.  The  mare  was  her  mare,  and 
she  had  been  wont  to  declare  that  Vengeance 
was  the  best  lady's  mount  she  had  ever  met 
with.  It  was  humiliating  to  be  told  authorita- 
tively by  a  man  who  seemed  to  know  all  about 
it,  that  the  mare  was  a  "  terrible  screw." 

"It  is  of  no  consequence  a  lady's  horse  being 
screwed  behind,"  she  replied  carelessly ;  "she 
goes  the  easier  for  it." 

He  laughed.  "Vengeance  is  more  than  a 
little  '  screwed  behind,'  Miss  Vane ;  she  has  not 
a  leg  left  tliis  morning ;  and  I  think,  when  you 
see  her  try  a  little  canter  (she's  free  enough,  I 
allow),  you  will  be  disposed  to  accept  the  car- 
riage arrangement." 

"What  in  the  world  shall  I  do  at  Denham 
without  Vengeance?"  Bella  asked  almost  pite- 
ously.  "Oh  dear!  something  is  always  hap- 
pening to  make  everything  else  unpleasant." 


Then  she  poured  herself  out  a  cup  of  tea,  for  the 
breakfast  was  on  the  table  all  this  time ;  and 
recovering  her  spirits  abruptly,  she  asked — 

"I  like  the  look  out  from  my  window  so 
much,  that  I  want  to  see  more  of  the  town. 
"We  must  wait,  I  mean  I  must  wait,  here  a 
couple  of  hours,  you  tell  me ;  can't  we  go  out 
and  walk  about?" 

He  made  one  feeble  protest  against  a  plan 
that  was  very  pleasant  to  him. 

"  You  won't  like  to  walk  about  in  your  habit, 
will  you  ?" 

"Why  not?"  she  asked,  opening  her  eyes 
with  a  little  stare  of  inquiry.  They  were  such 
lovely  eyes,  those  of  hers — they  were  so  very 
blue!  "You  don't  imagine  me  to  be  one  of 
those  women  who  are  awkward  in  a  habit  on 
the  earth  ?" 

"  I  do  not  imagine  you  to  be  one  of  those 
women  who  are  awkward  at  anything  or  in 
anything,"  he  replied.  "Yes;  let  un  go  out, 
by  all  means.  You  will  permit  me  to  be  your 
escort,  won't  you?"  Then  he  added,  in  a  lower 
tone,  "  And  you  will  forgive  me  for  having  dis- 
paraged Vengeance  to  you  ?" 

She  smiled  brightly,  and  nodded,  and  told 
him  "  there  was  her  hand  on  it,  if  he  liked." 
Then  he  took  the  hand  in  his,  and  felt  that  he 
had  better  not  kiss  it,  and  that  the  sooner  they 
went  out  for  their  stroll  through  the  town,  the 
better. 

They  went  out,  with  Rock  at  their  heels, 
through  the  yard  Time's  liand  had  touched — 
past  steady  ostlers  attending  to  respectable 
horses — past  little  groups  of  not  yet  disbanded 
volunteer  defenders  of  their  country — past  a 
veritable  English  mastiff,  who  was  chained,  and 
who  growled  at  Rock — out  into  the  quiet 
streets,  where  the  sunbeams  lay  in  mellowed 
masses  of  golden  light  on  the  one  side,  and  the 
early  dews  of  morning  nourished  the  ferns  and 
mosses  that  were  about  the  gratings  of  old 
houses  on  the  other. 

What  a  dear  old  town  Bella  Vane  thought 
it !  It  looked  as  if  it  might  have  attained  to  its 
present  position  of  solid,  unostentatious  prospe- 
rity a  thousand  years  ago,  and  had  remained 
stationary  ever  since.  It  was  not  bustling, 
thriving,  fussily  active  in  a  small  way  about 
smaller  things.  It  did  not  look  as  if  it  were 
doing  anything  for  a  living,  and  aspiring  to  be 
considered  "  go-a-head."  People  did  not  rush 
through  its  narrow  streets,  but  walked  calmly 
along,  as  if  it  were  not  of  the  slightest  conse- 
quence whether  they  were  "  there  " — wher- 
ever that  might  be — five  minutes  sooner  or 
later.  The  small  boys  even  were  not  addicted 
to  chaff,  but  looked  as  if  ever  before  them  loom- 
ed this  great  fact — "  I,  too,  may  be  a  chorister, 
and  wear  a  little  white  surplice,  and  elevate  my 
little  alto  in  the  cathedral  diurnally,  if  I  look — 
not  sharp." 

'The  streets  were  very  narrow  through  which 
the  lady  and  her  companion  wended  their  way, 
and  from  many  a  window  in  those  beetle-browed 
old  houses  on  either  side  did  eyes  gaze,  half- 
wonderingly,  wholly  admiringly,  upon  the  fair 
young  pair.  She — Bella  Vane — was  adjudged 
to  be  all  sorts  of  things  that  she  was  not  by  old  , 
ladies  of  a  speculative  turn  of  mind,  and  young 
ones  too.  She  must  be  Lady  Moretun,  they  said, 
the  wife  of  the  Colonel  of  the  West shire 


ON  GUARD. 


31 


Volunteer  Corps ;  or  perhaps  she  was  the  wife 
of  the  real  live  soldier,  the  genuine  man  of  blood 
and  carnage,  who  had  come  down  to  review 
them.  Then  they  told  over  their  breakfast- 
tables  how  Lady  Moretun  was  notoriously  care- 
less of  what  people  thought  about  her,  and 
afflicted  with  horsey  tastes,  and  a  habit  of  es- 
caping from  her  husband's  society  whenever 
she  was  able  to  do  so.  Thus  heads  were  shaken 
over  her,  though  they  knew  not  that  she  was 
Bella  Vane. 

She  meanwhile  was  very  happy  walking 
along  by  his  side,  and  talking,  not  of  the  life 
they  both  knew  so  well,  or  of  Stanley  Villars, 
but  of  the  quiet  scene  before  them — of  the  tall 
old  houses  and  their  moss-grown  bases — of  the 
placid  age  of  the  town,  and  the  equally  placid 
youth  of  it  in  the  form  of  its  boys — and  of  how 
it  was  altogether  like  a  page  from  a  book,  this 
coming  there,  and  meeting,  and  walking  toge- 
ther thus. 

She  did  not  tell  him  that  the  carol  of  the 
song-birds  above  them  sounded  more  sweetly  in 
her  ears  than  ever  similar  strains  had  sounded 
before.  She  was  unconscious  herself  of  how 
very  deeply  the  beauty  of  the  day,  and  the  calm 
in  the  air,  and  the  song  of  the  birds,  was  affect- 
ing her.  All  she  knew  was,  that  emotions  the 
like  of  which  had  never  thrilled  her  before  were 
thrilling  her  now.  All  she  regretted  was,  that 
life  could  not  be  all  walking  through  old  towns 
in  the  mellow  sunbeams,  with  one  on  whom  the 
gloss  of  novelty  still  lingered,  and  not  being 
compelled  to  analyse  why  the  doing  so  was 
sweet. 

There  were  broad,  thick  avenues  of  beeches 
and  of  elms  in  the  cathedral  close,  and  walking 
in  the  shade  of  one  of  these,  with  the  sunbeams 
flickering  down  through  the  leaves  upon  their 
j  heads,  the  morning  chants  came  floating  by, 
arid  fell  upon  their  ears.  They  paused  there  to 
listen  to  the  sweetly  solemn  strains,  and  time 
went  by,  and  they  were  very  silent. 

It  ceased  at  last — the  peal  of  the  organ,  and 
the  choral  strains,  and  the  silence  that  those 
who  had  listened  to  these  things  had  kept. 
With  a  half  glance  at  the  sky,  as  if  he  expected 
to  see  a  cloud  there,  with  a  half  frown  on  his 
brow,  as  if  the  shadow  of  the  expected  cloud 
had  already  fallen  on  it,  Claude  Walsingham 
spoke — 

"  By  Jove !  that  is  one  of  the  things  that  are 
over  for  everl" 

The  girl's  lips  moved  nervously  for  a  moment 
or  two,  but  no  sound  emanated  from  them. 

"  You  are  tired,  Miss  Vane  ?"  he  interro- 
gated, relapsing  abruptly  into  common-place 
tones. 

"  Not  of  being  here,  or  of  walking,"  she  re- 
plied, and  she  looked  full  into  his  eyes  as  she 
said  it. 

"  But  it  is  clear  that  you  are  tired  of  some- 
thing. I  shall  suppose  that  something  to  be  my 
society,  if  you  do  not  tell  me  what  it  is." 

Again  there  came  that  little  nervous  quiver 
over  her  lips  that  he  had  marked  before,  but  it 
merged  into  a  smile  this  time. 

"  Would  you  feel  at  all  sorry  if  you  knew 
that  we  should  never  come  here  again  ?"  she 
asked. 

"I  can't  say  that  I  should  have  any  very  deep 
feeling  on  the  subject,  as  I  can  only  suppose 


that  our  remaining  away  would  be  the  act  of 
our  own  free-will." 

"I  shall  feel  that  I  am  leaving,  something  for 
ever,  perhaps,  that  I  am  very  sorry  to  leave, 
when  I  drive  away  this  morning."" 

"Will  that  something  be  the  town?  No,  no, 
Miss  Vane ;  it  is  a  bright  morning,  and  all  things 
look  well  in  its  light,  and  a  combination  of  un- 
toward circumstances  has  given  birth  to  some 
new  ideas  in  both  of  us.  Ask  yourself,  have 
you  not  felt  the  same  before  ?  and  with  your 
temperament,  are  you  not  tolerably  certain  to 
feel  the  same  again  ?" 

She  shook  her  head  impatiently. 

"  I  don't  want  to  build  up  a  romance  from 
the  sunbeams,  and  the  green  leaves,  and  the 
flickering  light.  You  need  not  fear  that  I  did, 
Major  Walsingham." 

"They  were  not  your  sole  materials.  You 
have  left  out  the  most  important  ingredient  in 
your  catalogue.  Let  us  walk  back  to  the  '  Red 
Lion,'  Miss  Vane.  I  think  I  have  got  a  sun- 
stroke." 

"  Which  you  will  recover  from  as  speedily  as 
I  shall  from  the  effects  of  my  sorrow  at  leaving 
this  pretty  day  and  town  behind  me,"  she  said, 
in  a  low  tone.  "  When  I  tell  Stanley,  how  he 
will  laugh  at  the  idea  of  the  strains  of  the  organ 
•having  made  me  sentimental  for  an  instant." 

"  When  you  tell  Stanley,  I  have  no  doubt  but 
that  he  will  laugh  as  you  say.  What  a  power 
of  mischief  the  su*  has  to  answer  for ;  it  has  af- 
fected my  head,  I  believe :  if  I  verify  that  be- 
lief, I  shall  not  go  on  to  Denham." 

She  would  not  look  at  him  when  he  said  this, 
for  she  knew  that  she  had  the  name  of  a  flirt — 
that  sho  was  so  dubbed  by  the  idle-tongued 
majority  who  knew  nothing  at  all  of  the  matter 
— and  it  occurred  to  her  that  he  might  be  test- 
ing her  "while  yet  there  was  time,"  for  Stan- 
ley's sake.  So,  though  his  declaration  that  this 
morning's  sun  had  affected  his  head  made  her 
tremble  with  a  feeling  that  had  more  joy  and 
hope  than  pain  in  it,  she  would  not  look  at  him 
to  read  the  truth  in  his  eyes. 

She  was  a  flirt.  It  was  the  curse  of  her  na- 
ture to  long  for  love.  Bella  was  not  one  to  care 
for  attention  and  superficial  admiration  alone ; 
she  never  sighed  to  be  made  much  of- — to  be 
put  upon  a  pedestal  before  people ;  but  she  had 
a  dangerous  yearning  for  that  sort  of  good  will, 
between  which  and  love  it  is  so  extremely  dif- 
ficult to  draw  the  line.  Directly  a  man  proved 
himself  capable  of  interesting  her,  she  desired 
his  friendship ;  desired  him  to  feel  warmly  in- 
terested in  her,  tender  to  her  errors  of  judg- 
ment, and  himself  a  better  man  for  being  under 
her  influence.  Miss  Vane  had  a  great  notion 
of  elevating  and  improving  so  much  of  mankind 
as  came  under  her  influence.  But  lately  a 
doubt  had  arisen  as  to  how  far  her  efforts  in  be- 
half of  the  many  might  be  compatible  with  her 
duties  towards  the  one  she  had  promised  to 
marry.  This  morning  the  doubt  assailed  her 
more  poignantly  than  ever,  as  she  walked  along 
by  Claude  Walsingham's  side,  and  listened  to 
his  words,  and  feared  to  look  in  his  face. 

He,  meanwhile,  was  thinking  her  very  lovely 
and  very  dangerous,  alike  as  a  friend  for  him- 
self, and  a  wife  for  Stanley  Villars.  He  saw 
how  undesigning  she  was,  how  terribly  addicted 
to  making  herself  pleasant,  how  hopelessly  in- 


32 


ON  GUARD. 


capable  of  being  entirely  discreet !  There  was 
no  evil,  there  was  not  the  shadow  of  guile,  he 
did  her  the  justice  of  discovering,  in  that  win- 
ning way,  which  looked  so  strangely,  what  it 
was  in  fact — an  earnest  attempt  to  make  him 
think  as  kindly  as  he  could  of  her.  There  was 
no  idle  coquetry  in  her  softened  tones  and  looks 
when  she  addressed  him,  in  the  delicate  flattery 
of  her  averted  eyes,  in  the  quiver  of  dread 
which  possessed  her  when  she  spoke  of  depart- 
ing and  leaving  the  scene,  the  hour,  and  him- 
self, behind.  There  was  no  bad  design,  no  low, 
idle  coquetry  in  all  this,  but  it  was  very  danger- 
ous. Claude  "Walsingham  felt  the  full  force  of 
the  danger,  and  wished  with  all  his  heart,  since 
he  had  met  her,  and  she  was  engaged,  that  it 
had  been  to  any  other  than  his  old  friend, 
Stanley  Villars. 

Miss  Vane  fell  a  prey  to  remorse  during  the 
latter  part  of  their  walk  home.  It  occurred  to 
her  that  they  had  long  outstayed  the  specified 
two  hours.  "I  never  thought  of  asking  you 
to  see  what  time  it  was,  and  I  never  can  wear 
my  watch  when  I  ride,"  she  said,  as  they  ap- 
proached the  "  Red  Lion,"  and  essayed  to  shake 
off  some  of  the  feelings  the  calm  of  the  close 
and  the  environs  of  the  cathedral  had  engen- 
dered. 

"  And  it  will  be  useless  for  me  to  look  at 
mine,  for  I  forgot  to  wind  it  up  last  night,"  he 
replied.  He  could  not  bring  his  mind  to  de- 
ciding precisely  the  exact  period  he  had  passed 
under  this  phase  of  feeling  that  was  new,  and 
dangerous,  and  delightful  to  him.  He  could  not 
bear  to  limit  it,  though  the  doing  so  would  not 
shorten  its  duration  by  one  instant.  He  rather 
desired  that  it  should  remain  a  dreamy  joy — 
shading  off  into  the  Nothing  that  must  surely 
follow  by  imperceptible  gradations. 

Promptly  upon  the  dread  that  she  had  out- 
stayed the  two  hours  that  had  been  vouchsafed 
them  in  mercy  to  the  horses,  there  dawned  an- 
other. Stanley  would  surely  be  annoyed  by 
that  forgetfulness  of  hers  which  might  savour 
of  forgetfulness  of  him.  He  would  probably 
say  something  calm  and  disagreeable  to  her 
when  she  returned,  weary  and  worn  out,  to 
Denham.  He  would  blame  her — she  told  her- 
self— for  what  she  could  not  have  helped  had 
she  been  Discretion  herself,  and  think  and  say 
that  she  might  have  done  sundry  things  which 
she  had  not  done,  and  have  left  undone  several 
acts  which  she  had  committed.  He  would  be 
hard  to  her,  she  feared — hard  in  an  affectionate, 
masterful  manner  that  might  not  be  put  aside 
— and  he  would  blame  her  judiciously,  and 
counsel  her  wisely,  as  she  hated  to  be  blamed 
and  counselled. 

Her  eyes  kindled  as  she  pictured  to  herself 
the  scene  that  would  probably  ensue,  and  her 
cheeks  grew  rosy.  It  was  hard  for  the  petted 
daughter,  the  autocrat  of  her  own  house,  to  feel 
that  she  might  be  reproved  and  censured,  and 
that  she  had  no  appeal  against  it.  In  the  inner- 
most depths  of  her  soul  she  acknowledged  that 
she  was  a  little  in  awe  of  this  man,  whom  she 
had  promised  to  marry.  A  little  in  awe  of  him, 
and  a  great  deal  in  love  with  him,  of  course ; 
but  still  just  a  little  weary  of  being  in  awe  of 
him  already.  It  was  a  case  of  rarefied  atmo- 
sphere disagreeing  with  her,  that  was  all — a  re- 
petition of  the  old  Guinevre  and  Arthur  story,  a 


new  edition  of  the  eternal  difficulty  of  breathing 
in  a  "  perfect  air." 

Miss  Vane's  heart  went  very  low  indeed 
when  she  entered  the  hotel  yard,  and  found  her 
uncle's  carriage  standing,  with  the  horses  put 
to,  already  awaiting  her.  But  it  went  lower 
still  when,  from  the  ivy-covered  porch  to  the 
right,  Stanley  Villars  advanced  to  meet  her. 
She  almost  felt,  as  he  came  towards  her,  that  he 
was  her  foe,  and  that  the  man  by  her  side  was 
her  natural  protector  against  him,  and  involun-  f 
tarily  she  exclaimed — 

"  Major  Walsingham,  what  shall  we  say  ?" 

"  The  truth,  I  think,"  he  replied,  in  a  low 
voice ;  then  he  cried  aloud,  "  Villars,  I  have 
done  my  best  to  make  Miss  Vane  feel  the  time 
she  was  compelled  to  wait  here  as  little  dis- 
agreeable as  possible :  she  must  tell  you  whe- 
ther I  have  succeeded  or  not." 

"  My  dear  Claude,  I  am  only  happy  that  you 
were  here  to  take  care  of  he'r,  whether  the  time 
has  been  disagreeable  or  not,"  Stanley  Villars 
answered  heartily ;  and  Bella  Vane  felt,  as  he 
spoke,  that  she  had  prepared  her  defence 
against  what  he  might  feel  and  say  for  nothing, 
and  that  he  had  unbounded  confidence  in  his 
friend.  It  was  better  that  it  should  be  so — far, 
far  better ;  but  still  she  was  conscious  of  a  little 
disappointment. 

"  I  suppose  there  was  a  perfect  tumult  last 
night  at  Denham  on  my  account  ?"  she  asked. 

"  You  would  not  be  pleased  were  I  to  tell 
you  that  Denham  was  indifferent  to  your  non- 
appearance,  Bella." 

"No,  of  course  I  shouldn't;  but  shall  I  have 
to  explain  how  it  came  to  pass  that  I  lost  my 
way  in  tangled  roads  that  I  didn't  know,  and 
fondly  hope  I  never  shall  know,  because  rather 
than  do  that  I  would  flee  my  country.  I  shall 
hate  to  talk  about  it.  I  have  lamed  Vengeance 
— that  ought  to  be  held  sufficient  expiation  for 
all  my  sins." 

"  We  will  soon  replace  Vengeance,*"  Stanley 
Villars  said,  cheerily.  He  was  so  rejoiced  to 
find  Bella  safe  and  in  honourable  keeping,  that 
lie  would  scarcely  suffer  himself  to  remark  that 
her  tones  were  querulous,  and  her  manner  con- 
strained. 

"Indeed,  we  can't  soon  replace  Vengeance!" 

"  Clearly,  we  can't  replace  her  here  this  day," 
Claude  Walsingham  said,  "still  I  think  it  may 
be  done  in  time.  "  Don't  you  think  the  sooner 
we  all  get  away  from  this  place  the  better 
Stanley  ?"  he  added,  in  a  low  tone,  to  his  friend 

"  Decidedly.     Are  you  ready  to  start,  Bella  ?" 

"  Oh !  quite  ready.  How  did  you  come  over 
— on  horseback,  Stanley  ?" 

"Yes;  but  I  shall  leave  my  horse  to  be  led 
back  with  Vengeance." 

"  I  shall  be  but  a  poor  companion — I'm  too 
tired  to  talk ;  and,  in  fact,  I  hate  talking  when 
I  am  driving,"  she  said,  wearily.  It  was  not 
a  graceful  thing  on  the  part  of  the  beauty  to 
say  this  to  her  betrothed,  but  she  was  not  in  a 
graceful  humour  just  then. 

"  Well,  I  was  thinking  that  as  Claude  Wal- 
singham had  his  horses  here,  and  as  the  roads 
are  so  intricate,  that  I  would  get  him  to  drive 
me  over  to  Denham,  and  so  do  away  with  the 
possibility  of  his  losing  his  way,"  Stanley  Vil-    \ 
lurs  rejoined  hastily.     Then  Bella  fell  penitent     l 
— oh,  those  agonizing  interludes  of  penitence 


ON"  GUARD. 


and  said,  "Oh,  Stanley!"  deprecatingly ;  and 
Claude  watched  the  pair  attentively  to  mark 
whether  by  word  or  sign  she  would  strive  to 
make  Stanley  alter  his  determination. 

But  she  did  not.  She  made  no  further  ap- 
peal than  those  two  word?,  "Oh,  Stanley!'1 
and  Stanley  took  no  notice  that  was  visible  to 
Claude  of  them.  Somehow  or  other,  it  was  al- 
most a  relief  to  the  man  who  had  seen  her  for  the 
first  time  on  the  previous  night  to  find  that  her 
future  husband  was  not  proposing  to  go  back 
to  Denham  in  the  carriage  with  her,  and  even 
greater  relief  was  it  still  to  mark  that  she  did 
not  desire  him  to  do  so. 

They  put  her  into  the  carriage  presently,  of- 
fered her  the  last  services  of  handing  her  in, 
and  saving  her  habit  from  the  wheel,  and  put- 
ting one  window  up  and  the  other  down,  as 
seemed  good  to  her.  Then  she  said  good-bye 
to  them  both,  and  in  reply  heard  from  Stanley 
that  he  "should  come  up  to  the  rectory  in  the 
evening  to  see  how  she  got  on,"  and  from  Ma- 
jor Walsingham  that  he  hoped  to  have  the 
honour  of  seeing  her  again  shortly.  But  yester- 
day she  had  pleaded  so  warmly  for  Stanley  to 
do  this  very  thing  he  was  now  pledging  him- 
self to  do,  and  then  he  had  refused.  "Well,  she 
could  not  unlive  the  past  few  hours  and  feel  as 
she  had  felt  yesterday,  that  was  all.  She  nod- 
ded assent  to  his  proposition,  and  drove  away 
with  a  sense  of  the  tender  grace  of  the  day  be- 
ing gone,  though  the  sunbeams  still  lay  in  mel- 
lowed masses  around  her,  and  the  birds  still 
carolled  high  and  clear  above  her  head. 

Fervently,— as  tne  old  town  and  the  events 
which  had  happened  in  it  appeared  to  recede  from 
her,  rather  than  she  to  move  away  from  them, — 
did  she  wish  that  "none  of  it"  had  happened. 
There  was  no  harm  done,  but  her  routine  had 
been  broken  up,  and  she  had  a  vague  sense  of 
discomfort  and  of  doubt,  as  to  whether  she 
should  take  quite  so  kindly  as  was  desirable  to 
routine  again.  It  had  been  a  bit  of  pure  ro- 
mance while  it  lasted ;  but  it  had  been  such  a 
tiny  bit,  and  had  lasted  such  a  very  short  time, 
that  she  could  but  wish  she  had  never  come 
upon  it  at  all.  She  had  been  fraught  with  a 
certain  ecstatic  feeling  as  she  had  walked 
through  those  narrow  streets,  and  stood  under 
the  sombre  beeches.  It  must  have  been  be- 
cause she  saw  them  all  "  for  the  first  time/'  she 
told  herself;  for  something  whispered  to  her 
that,  even  could  she  persuade  Stanley  to  ride 
over  to  the  picturesque  old  town  with  her  again, 
the  ecstatic  feeling  would  not  return — that  was 
over  for  ever. 

The  same  indescribable  sensations  which  had 
caused  her  on  the  past  night  to  be  extra  devout, 
made  her  now  dwell  upon  so  much  of  Stanley 
Villars'  magnanimity  and  general  superiority  to 
suspicion  and  distrust  as  she  could  recall.  She 
reflected  upon  how  entirely  satisfied  he  had 
seemed  when  he  found  that  his  old  friend  had 
been  guarding  her  the  whole  time;  how  en- 
tirely satisfied,  how  warmly  reliant,  how  pleased, 
that  Claude  should  have  been  there,  since  he 
himself  was  absent.  The  reflection  made  her 
wince,  and  move  uneasily ;  it  was  very  perfect 
trust  that  he  had  evinced  in  her  and  in  Claude 
Walsingham ;  and  from  any  other  man  to  any 
other  man,  about  any  other  woman  than  herself, 
she  would  have  regarded  it  as  a  very  natural 


trust  too ;  indeed  she  would  have  scoffed  at  the 
notion  of  aught  else  being  possible.  But  it  was 
about  herself,  and  she  was  exceptional ;  and 
about  Claude  Walsingham,  and  he  was  the 
same.  The  loving  trust  in  her  faith,  the  un- 
questioning reliance  on  Claude's  honour,  seemed 
burthcnsorne  to  her,  she  knew  not  why.  Per- 
haps it  was  that  she  was  conscious  that  it 
would  not  have  been  felt  and  expressed,  had 
every  heart-throb  of  hers  been  heard  by  Stan- 
ley during  that  morning  walk,  or  had  Claudo 
Walsingham's  complaint  of  the  effects  of  the 
sun  sounded  in  the  ears  of  his  friend  as  it  had 
in  hers. 


CHAPTER  XL 
CLAUDE'S  CONFIDENCES. 

THE  two  men  watched  the  carriage  drive 
away  out  of  the  yard  without  speaking.  When 
it  was  no  longer  in  sight  Claude  turned  round, 
took  a  cigar  from  his  case,  offered  one  to  Stan- 
ley Villars,  and  then  elaborately  lighted  his 
own,  and  puffed  av;  ay  at  it  for  a  few  seconds. 

"  Come  and  look  at  my  horses,  Stanley,"  he 
then  said ;  and  before  Stanley  could  accede  to 
his  request,  he  added,  "Come,  and  I'll  introduce 
you  to  my  colonel." 

"Is  he  here?  Certainly,  I'll  be  introduced 
to  him." 

"  Of  course  he  is  here.  It  was  his  coming 
brought  me  down.  He  came  to  review  Lord 
Moretun's  corps ;  and  as  it  sounded  like  being 
in  your  neighbourhood,  I  thought  I  might  a.s 
well  come  with  him,  and  see  him  through  it, 
and  the  dinner  that  they  threatened." 

"  It  is  a  very  fortunate  thing  that  you  were 
here,"  Stanley  rejoined.  "Miss  Vane  would 
have  been  unpleasantly  situated  indeed,  if  she 
had  not  met  with  you." 

"Oh!  you're  very  good  to  say  so,"  Claude 
replied,  in  a  slightly  embarrassed  tone.  "You 
overrate  my  services,  old  boy ;  however,  I  did 
my  best — on  my  soul,  I  did." 

"  You  need  give  no  such  strong  assurance  to 
me  as  that,  Claude,"  Stanley  Villars  replied, 
gravely. 

"  Don't  drop  on  to  a  fellow  for  forgetting  for 
an  instant  that  you  are  not  as  you  used  to  be, 
Stanley.  Come  and  look  at  Miss  Vane's  mare." 

He  seemed  excited — almost  agitated.  Still, 
there  being  no  valid  cause  for  either  excitement 
or  agitation,  Stanley  Villars  would  not  permit 
himself  to  observe  it. 

"  Poor  Vengeance !  she  fell  lame,  I  under- 
stand. I  must  find  some  steady  fellow  to  take 
her  home  quietly." 

"My  man's  here;  he  shall  take  her  home," 
Claude  interposed,  "he  is  to  be  relied  upon  in 
the  first  place ;  and  in  the  second,  he  will  be 
well  out  of  the  way,  as  I  have  several  things  to 
say  to  you  that  he  would  overhear  if  he  went 
with  us.  I  have  got  a  new  trap — come  and 
look  at  that." 

"What  shall  we  do?"  Stanley  Villars  asked, 
laughing.  "You  are  fruitful  in  propositions; 
but  you  don't  carry  one  of  them  out.  What 
do  you  want  me  to  do  first  ?" 


34 


ON  GUARD. 


"  We  will  order  my  cattle  in  at  once ;  then 
I  can  send  off  ray  man  with  the  mare,"  Claude 
replied.  "You  don't  care  about  staying  here 
any  longer,  do  you  ?" 

""Certainly  not." 

"  Damned"  hole.  I  wish  I  had  never  come  to 
it,"  Claude  growled.  He,  too,  was  suffering 
from  a  revulsion  of  feeling,  and  it  made  him 
unconditionally  ill-tempered. 

"  I  can't  say  that,  Claude.  However,  I  am 
willing  to  get  away  as  soon  as  you  please." 

They  walked  into  the  stable  now,  to  look  at 
Vengeance,  who  was  standing  in  a  loose  box, 
with  a  cloth  on,  and  with  pads  upon  her  knees. 

"You  will  never  let  Miss  Vane  ride  that 
beast  again,  I  should  hope,  Stanley,"  Major 
Walsingham  said,  as  he  went  up  to  the  slender- 
limbed  brown.  Then  he  remembered  that 
Bella  had  called  the  mare  "  Dear  Vengeance," 
and  an  access  of  softer  feeling  set  in,  and  he 
repented  him  of  that  term  he  had  used  towards 
Miss  Vane's  pet  horse. 

"  I  can  supply  her  with  a  horse  while  I  am 
with  you,"  he  went  on ;  "  that  is  to  say,  if  you'll 
permit  me  to  offer  her  a  mount,  I  can  lend  her 
one  of  the  nicest  stepping  horses  you  ever  saw. 
Come  and  look  at  them." 

"  Unquestionably,  I  will  permit  it,  and  look 
at  them  too,"  Stanley  said,  as  they  walked  on 
into  another  stable,  where  a  pair  of  iron  greys 
were  stalled.  Then  the  pride  of  ownership  in 
good  horseflesh  came  to  Claude  Walsingham's 
aid,  and  he  ceased  to  be  either  ill-tempered  or 
embarrassed. 

"That's  the  best  ride  of  the  two,"  he  said, 
pointing  to  one  of  them.  "  I  always  put  him 
in  on  the  off-side ;  I  used  him  as  a  break-horse 
for  the  others,  for  he's  as  mild  as  he  is  game. 
There's  strength  there,  eh  ?  strength  as  well  as 
speed?" 

"When  Stanley  had  eulogised  the  horses  to 
the  heart's  content  of  their  owner,  he  was  con- 
veyed by  Claude  to  the  coach-house,  where  the 
trap  stood. 

"  But  you  don't  see  it  to  advantage  here,"  he 
said ;  "  in  fact,  it  looks  nothing  till  the  horses 
are  in ;  so  we'll  have  them  in  at  once  and  go, 
shall  we?" 

He  was  indeed  strangely  undecided ;  Stanley 
Villars  regretted  that  the  rush  and  hurry  of 
London  life  should  have  set  its  mark  so  unmis- 
takably upon  his  friend. 

They  got  away  at  last  without  that  introduc- 
tion to  the  colonel  coming  off  of  which  Claude 
had  at  first  made  a  point.  "  He's  linked  in  for 
the  time  being  with  a  lot  of  cads,  from  whom 
he  can't  escape,"  he  explained;  "it's  all  very 
well  for  him,  for  he  will  go  off  directly,  and  be 
out  of  it ;  but  you're  in  the  neighbourhood,  and 
you  mightn't  like  it  if  you  met  them  again."  The 
truth  was,  that  he  was  afraid  ribald  jokes  might 
be  uttered  relative  to  that  damsel  in  distress, 
whom  he  had  been  so  prominently  squiring  that 
morning ;  and  Stanley  Villars  might  take  such 
jests  amiss. 

The  trap  afforded  them  food  for  conversation 
for  some  distance.  It  was  a  new  style  of  thing 
altogether — a  combination  of  double  dog-cart 
and  phaeton  that  went  very  well  together.  The 
one  man  declared  it  to  be  more  useful  than  a 
mail-phaeton  in  the  country,  and  the  other 
agreed  with  him,  without  knowing  why,  in  the 


most -affable  manner;  and  they  both  averred 
that  it  showed  the  horses  off  well — that  it  made 
less  noise  than  any  vehicle  they  had  either  of 
them  ever  chanced  to  occupy  before,  and  that 
it  ran  lighter  than  anything  the  imagination  of 
either  had  ever  conceived.  They  talked  "  trap," 
in  fact,  as  long  as  it  was  possible  to  do  so,  a 
little  perhaps  because  they  were  desirous  of 
staving  off  other  subjects  till  they  had  become 
more  accustomed  to  each  other. 

At  last,  when  they  had  been  on  the  road 
some  time,  and  the  horses  had  got  into  their 
stride,  and  the  hedges  were  going  by  them  at 
the  rate  of  fourteen  miles  an  hour,  Stanley  Vil- 
lars paved  the  way  to  return  to  the  old  confi- 
dential intercourse  that  had  existed  between 
them,  by  asking — 

"Have  you  seen  anything  of  my  people 
lately?" 

"I  was  at  Lady  Villars'  (your  mother's  I 
mean)  one  afternoon  of  last  week — no,  the  week 
before.  Your  sister  told  me  then  about  your 
engagement." 

"  Which  sister  ? — Florence  ?" 

"Yes,  Florence,"  Claude  replied,  driving  very 
carefully  now,  and  bestowing  vast  attention  to 
his  reins. 

"  Florence  and  Bella  don't  know  each  other 
yet,  but  for  all  that  Florry  is  intensely  pleased 
about  it." 

"  She  expressed  herself  delighted  to  me." 
Then  he  drew  back  a  little  to  get  his  horses  to- 
gether before  they  came  to  the  brow  of  a  decli- 
vity, and  went  on — "  I  congratulate  you,  old 
fellow,  heartily,  heartily!" 

"Thank  you;  your  written  congratulations 
sounded  less  warmly." 

"  Don't  be  annoyed  at  that,  Stanley.  I  think 
you  now  a  devilish  lucky  fellow,  and  congratu- 
late you  accordingly.  When  I  wrote  I  didn't 
think  you  a  lucky  fellow,  and  so  I  failed  in  put- 
ting the  warmth  in,  I  suppose." 

"  My  dear  fellow,  annoyed !  I  do  not  believe 
that  the  opinion  of  the  whole  world  would 
weigh  with  me  on  such  a  question  as  my  mar- 
riage: that  is  too  entirely  to  myself  for  me  to 
care  even  what  you  thought  about  it  when  once 
I  was  assured  that  I  was  acting  wisely  myself." 

"  You  are  assured  of  it  ?" 

"Perfectly!" 

"  Thank  God !  I  wish  I  could  say  the  same 
about  myself."  Then  he  went  on  to  tell  Stanley 
of  what  the  wine,  and  the  warmth,  and  the 
witchery  of  that  woman,  and  the  hour,  had 
done  for  him  at  Richmond  but  the  other  day. 

"  It  is  out  of  the  question  that  I  marry  her, 
you  know — that  you  must  perceive  ?" 

"  Why  ?"  Stanley  Villars  asked  gravely. 

"  Why,  if  you  don't  know,  I  will  refrain  from 
telling  you  more  than  that  it  is  out  of  the  ques- 
tion. She  is  very  charming,  and  deuced  pretty 
by  gas-light,  and  no  man,  I  am  assured,  can 
'  breathe  a  word  against  her.'  "  Then  he  flicked 
his  horses,  and  as  they  burst  into  a  faster  trot 
he  burst  into  a  laugh,  and  cried,  "  Just  fancy 
my  marrying  a  woman  about  whom  I  am  told 
'not  a  detracting  word  can  be  breathed!' — by 
Jove!  just  fancy  it!" 

"What  do  you  purpose  doing?  It  seems  to 
me  that  you  must  do  something,  since  you  have 
asked  her  to  marry  you,"  Stanley  said  indig- 
nantly. He  was  inexpressibly  grieved  and 


ON  GUARD. 


35 


shocked  that  this  man,  whom  he  had  half-un- 
consciously  designed  for  his  pet  sister,  Florry, 
should  have  been  wasting  the  h'rstfruits  of  his 
heart,  and  offering  his  first  vows  on  a  shady 
shrine.  But  for  all  that  he  could  not  bear  to 
hear  light  mention  made  of  that  shrine's  claims 
on  its  self-ordained  devotee. 

"Oh!  get  out  of  it  some  way  or  other;  it  is 
one  of  those  things  that  can  be  done.  Don't 
look  disgusted,  Stanley ;  don't  you  see,  old  fel- 
low, the  facts  are  these — my  breaking  that 
lightly -offered  and  accepted  vow  won't  cause 
-•ny  more  than  half  an  hour's  annoyance;  my 
keeping  it  would  make  my  whole  family  mise- 
rable, and  kill  my  mother,  I  believe.  I  hardly 
know  why  I  have  named  it  to  you  at  all,"  he 
naid,  meditatively. 

He  did  hardly  know  himself  that  he  men- 
tioned this,  that  he  meant  to  be  a  mere  passing 
folly,  to  Stanley,  only  because  he  desired  to 
make  Stanley  aware  as  early  as  possible  that 
no  secret  tie  of  feeling  still  bound  him  to  Flo- 
rence. This  was  his  motive,  but  he  barely 
acknowledged  it  to  his  own  heart.  To  plot 
ever  so  remotely  about  Florry  seemed  too  foul 
a  thing  for  him  to  deem  himself  capable  of 
doing  it.  It  was  not  plotting !  He  told  himself 
that  it  was  not  plotting!  It  was  precaution — 
precaution  pure  and  simple — nothing  more. 

Claude  Walsingham  essayed  too  determinately 
to  be  as  he  had  ever  been  with  his  old  Eton 
friend,  for  the  event  to  repay  the  effort.  The 
result  is  almost  invariably  poor  when  so  much 
labour  is  bestowed  upon  the  working  of  it  out. 
Unlimited  confidence,  perfect  understanding, 
friendship  flawless  and  unalloyed,  are  things 
that  are  best  portrayed  by  a  few  bold  strokes. 
Laborious  fillings  in,  and  tonings  down,  and 
shadings  off  are  apt  to  destroy  the  resemblance 
to  the  thing  to  be  represented.  Stanley  Yillars 
felt,  and  felt  with  a  sorrowful  foreboding,  that 
Claude  was  more  utterly  unlike  the  Claude  of 
old,  at  the  time  when  he  most  carefully  at- 
tempted to  reproduce  himself  by  countless  allu- 
sions and  reminiscences,  and  spontaneous  asser- 
tions of  unaltered  feeling,  than  at  any  other 
moment.  He  was  changed! — changed  much 
in  many  things,  but  in  nothing  so  much  as  in 
that  peculiar  manner,  half-boyish,  half-brotherly, 
which  had  been  his  of  yore  to  Stanley,  and 
which  he  now  endeavoured  to  render  with 
photographic  accuracy. 

Indeed  it  was  rendered  with  photographic 
accuracy,  for  it  was  like,  and  yet  odiously  dis- 
similar to  the  original.  It  was  a  hard,  dry, 
material  copy  of  what  had-  been,  and  no  one 
could  be  more  conscious  of  its  failures  than  the 
man  who  made  it. 

But  he  was  very  frank 'with  Stanley  as  to  his 
prospects  and  plans.  Far  more  frank  and  out- 
spoken, indeed,  than  he  would  have  been  had 
the  change  that  caused  the  copy  of  that  earlier 
manner  of  his  to  be  hard  and  dry,  not  come 
over  him.  He  told  Mr.  Villars  how  he  had 
been  going  ahead  for  the  last  two  or  three  years 
in  divers  ways — keeping  unholy  hours,  and 
speculative  society,  and  too  many  horses,  and 
other  things  that  were  not  good  for  him.  He 
was  sick  of  his  regiment,  too,  he  added,  and 
wanted  to  buy  a  commission  in  that  military 
holiest  of  holies,  the  Guards.  Furthermore,  he 
confessed  that  he  had  not  the  wherewithal  to 


compass  this  natural  ambition,  and  that  if  his 
father  supplied  him  with  it,  the  property  would 
suffer  in  a  way  that  it  would  be  humiliating  to 
the  Walsinghams  that  their  property  should 
suffer,  though  the  suffering  came  through  the 
hope  of  the  house.  "A  corner  of  the  estate 
that  we  don't  want  could  be  sold  well  enough ; 
but  then  it  would  be  devilish  unpleasant  to 
have  to  make  open  confession  of  having  over- 
shot the  mark  in  that  way,  you  see,"  he  said 
in  conclusion.  And  Stanley  said,  "Yes,  it 
would,"  and  wondered  silently  why  Claude 
would  not  avert  the  necessity  of  abolishing  the 
unwanted  corner  of  the  estate,  by  taking  what 
he  might  have  for  the  asking — Florence's  por- 
tion, namely,  and  her  own  sweetly  willing  self 
into  the  bargain. 

Naturally,  Stanley  did  not  say  this  aloud.  It 
was  just  one  of  the  things  that,  though  it  might 
possibly  do  much  good,  and  could  possibly  do 
no  manner  of  harm,  may  not  be  said  aloud.  He 
commenced  a  brief  argument  with  Claude  on 
the  absurdity  of  the  latter,  wishing  to  get  out 
of  a  regiment  that  he  found  to  be  too  expensive 
for  his  means  into  one  that  was  more  expensive 
still.  But  he  shortly  saw  the  folly  of  arguing 
with  a  man  who  was  bent  on  having  his  own 
way,  and  who  was  apt  to  put  out  the  mild  light 
of  sober.,  common  sense  with  sparkling  social 
reasons  for  doing  as  he  pleased. 

Major  Walsingham  brought  his  greys  into 
Denham,  to  the  admiration  of  the  whole  village, 
about  an  hour  after  Miss  Vane  had  made  her 
advent,  The  youth  of  the  day  was  gone,  but 
it  was  not  anywhere  near  its  decline  though ; 
there  were  a  good  many  hours  to  be  got  over 
before  he  could  see  Miss  Vane  again,  and  gain 
a  further  insight  into  the  character  of  the  girl 
who  would  exercise,  in  all  probability,  a  large 
influence  over  the  career  of  his  friend.  It  was 
a  large,  rambling,  old  farmhouse,  the  one  in 
which  Mr.  Villars  lodged,  and  behind  it  there 
was  a  large,  rambling,  old  garden,  with  a  stream- 
let running  through  the  midst  of  it,  and  seats 
close  to  the  streamlet,  and  fruit  trees  "-delight- 
fully situate  "  with  regard  to  the  seats.  There 
he  placed  himself,  with  all  that  was  latest  in 
literature  that  he  could  find,  and  what  with  a 
cigar  and  the  happy  consciousness  of  having 
nothing  to  do,  and  nobody  being  near  to  see 
him  do  it,  he  managed  to  get  over  the  afternoon. 
The  hours  did  not  fly  precisely,  but  they  were 
not  leaden-winged.  A  brief  period  in  such  a 
place  was  all  very  well — renovating  to  mind, 
body,  and  estate  in  fact.  But  he  caught 
himself  marvelling  how  Bella  Vane  could  have 
pledged  herself  to  remain  in  it,  and  similar 
scenes  to  it,  for  the  term  of  her  natural  life. 

Major  "Walsingham  had  altered  his  mind  as 
to  the  desirability  of  speedily  recommencing  his 
study  of  Miss  Vane's  character  when  evening 
came.  He  felt  a  repugnance  to  going  up,  and 
being  either  left  to  the  tender  mercies  of  Miss 
Vane's  relatives,  or  being  an  unwilling  and  un- 
wanted witness  of  the  manners  and  customs  of 
the  engaged  pair.  There  were  sundry  things 
that  he  compelled  himself  to  take  for  granted 
Amongst  these  was  the  pleasure  Miss  Vane 
would  perhaps  evince  at  sight  of  her  betrothed ; 
and  this  spectacle,  though  right  and  proper 
enough,  Claude  Walsingham  could  well  dis- 
pense wit>. 


86 


ON  GUARD. 


Mr.  Yillars  had  no  special  desire  for  the 
society  of  his  friend.  He  wanted  to  hear  an 
account,  before  possible  collusion,  of  what  had 
transpired  that  morning  before  his  own  arrival. 
Not  that  he  was  suspicious  of  Claude  or  dis- 
trustful of  Bella ;  but  still  he  did  want  to  hear 
about  it.  So  he  went  up  alone,  leaving  Major 
Walsingham  on  the  sofa,  feigning  sleepiness 
and  an  indifference  to  the*  duration  of  Stanley's 
visit  to  Miss  Vane  that  he  was  very  far  from 
feeling.  It  was  not  a  pleasant  thought  to  him, 
lying  there,  that  the  man  who  had  just  gone 
out  from  his  presence  had  gone  up  to  the  girl 
who  had  listened  to  the  organ's  swell,  and  the 
low,  mild  summer  whisper  of  the  trees,  with 
himself  that  morning — gone  up  armed  with 
legitimate  claims  on  her  affection  that  she  might 
possibly  pay. 

How  he  cursed  the  fate  that  had  brought 
him  there — not  there  to  Denham,  so  much  as 
to  that  old  town,  whose  quaint,  old,  quiet 
poetry  had  aided  in  the  creation  of  this  feeling, 
whatever  it  was,  that  began  to  oppress  him. 
How  he  cursed  that  fate,  and  also  that  fatal 
facility  for  being  touched  when  it  was  not  well 
to  be  touched,  which  he  was  fully  conscious  of 
in  himself,  and  half-fearfully  recognised  in  ano- 
ther. The  man  grew  half  afraid  of  himself  as 
he  sat  there  alone.  "  I  will  be  off  to-morrow," 
he  said  to  himself;  "if  a  night's  rest,  and  the 
knowledge  that  there's  nothing  to  be  done, 
even  were  I  blackguard  enough  to  wish  to  do 
it,  doesn't  cure  me."  Then  he  thought  again 
of  that  pair  up  at  the  rectory,  and  chafed  sorely 
at  the  thought  of  them,  and  went  into  a  very 
Inferno,  without  the  faintest  hope  of  a  Beatrice 
guiding  him  through  it. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

MRS.  VANE  PUTS  THINGS  IN  A  PLEASANT  LIGHT. 

Ox  the-  whole  it  would  have  been  better  for 
them  all  had  Claude  Walsingham  risked  possible 
neglect  or  mortification  to  himself,  and  gone  up 
to  the  rectory  that  night.  Had  he  been  there 
he  might  have  been  a  distressing  diversion  to 
Stanley,  and  an  obstacle  to  Miss  Yane's  uncon- 
ditional return  to  that  path  of  right  from  which, 
in  the  innermost  recesses  of  her  soul,  she  felt 
conscious  of  having  strayed.  Moreover,  he 
might  have  been  slightly  oppressive  to  Mr. 
Yane,  who  always  essayed  to  be  hilariously 
hospitable  to  young  men  when  first  they  enter- 
ed his  house,  and  who  speedily  relapsed  into  a 
low  frame  of  mind  on  making  the  disheartening 
discovery  that  his  hilarity  was  not  contagious, 
and  that  they  would  prefer  his  hospitality  with- 
out it.  Mrs.  Yane,  too,  would  have  been  sub- 
jected to  nervous  emotions  when  the  fact  of  his 
being  dependent  on  her  for  social  entertain- 
ment dawned  upon  her.  But  these  things,  one 
and  all.  would  have  been  better  than  that 
which  did  happen.  He  stayed  away,  and  he 
was  talked  about. 

Bella  had  laboriously  avoided  mention  of  him 
as  long  as  she  could,  when  recounting  to  her 
aunt  on  her  return  that  morning,  how  it  came 
to  pass  that  she  had  not  returned  the  previous 
night.  But  his  appearance  in  her  story  was 


inevitable,  therefore  he  finally  appeared,  and 
was  immediately  seized  upon  by  Mrs.  Yane, 
with  the  healthy  avidity  old  ladies  do  occasion- 
ally display  in  grasping  hold  of  what  is  appa- 
rently the  least  important  point.  "  Major 
Walsingham!  you  don't  say  so?"  Mrs.  Yane 
had  exclaimed  when  Bella  made  her  hasty 
mention  of  him.  "Well,  it's  one  of  the  most 
extraordinary  things  I  ever  heard  !  Here,  Mr. 
Yane,  do  listen;  quite  a  coincidence;  tell  it 
again,  Bella.  Is  he  tall  ?  " 

"  My  dear  aunt,  I  really  can't  say.  Besides, 
what  does  it  signify? " 

"  Oh  no,  only  his  coming  here  makes  it  seem 
so  strange.  Did  he  seem  very  much  pleased  to 
meet  you  ?  " 

"  No." 

"  Not  pleased !  Well,  I  am  sure  all  Mr. 
Yillars'  friends  might  be  pleased  without  any 
very  great  exercise  of  toleration.  Did  he  say 
anything  about  the  engagement? " 

"Really  we  did  not  go  into  the  question," 
Bella  replied,  coldly,  and  for  a  few  minutes 
Mrs.  Yane  was  shut  up. 

Later  in  the  day  she  started  the  subject 
again,  for  there  was  a  lack  of  new  and  original 
matter  in  that  retired  little  village,  and  Mrs. 
Yane  made  the  most  of  that  which  she  could 
get.  It  did  not  occur  to  her  that  her  beauti- 
ful niece  was  suspiciously  reserved  about  the 
stranger.  It  did  not  strike  her  that  this  reti- 
cence was  an  exceptional  thing.  She  always 
found  Bella  wanting  in  the  spirit  of  detail; 
always  regretted  that  Miss  Yane  did  not  dis- 
burden herself  of  every  word  and  look  that 
others  had  given  to  her,  and  she  to  others,  on 
her  return  home  from  the  tamest  excursion. 
Now  her  regrets  were  aggravated,  for  this  had 
not  been  a  tame  excursion.  She  longed  to  hear 
all  about  it,  and  Bella,  as  usual,  would  not  tell 
her  without  being  questioned. 

"  Did  they  seem  nice  and  respectful  at 
the  'Red  Lion,'  Bella?  In  my  young  days 
there  was  no  hotel  like  it  in  the  town.  We 
always  stay  there  now  when  we  go  to  the 
festival." 

"Yes.  they  were  very  nice  and  respectful," 
Bella  answered.  "I  should  like  to  have  seen 
them  other,  indeed,  to  me." 

"Did  they  give  you  a  good  breakfast?" 

"  I  believe  it  was  good.  It  was  hot,  and 
there  was  an  immense  lot  of  it,  as  there  always 
is  at  those  horrid  inns,  I  suppose ;  but  I  couldn't 
eat." 

"Not  eat!  Ah!  poor  child!  thougH  how 
could  you,  sitting  down  alone." 

"I  didn't  sit — I  mean,  how  should  I,  in- 
deed." 

"  You  didn't  sit !  why  not  ?" 

"I  didn't  sit  down  alone,  I  mean  to  say," 
Bella  said,  laughing. 

"Who  was  with  you?  Mr.  Yillars  was  not 
over  there  to  breakfast,  was  he  ?" 

"No,  aunt,  but  Major  Walsingham  was; 
didn't  I  tell  you  ?" 

"  No,  you  have  not  told  me.  I  want  to  hear 
about  him.  I  am  quite  anxious  to  see  this 
friend  of  Mr.  Yillars'."  \ 

"  Pray  don't  say  much  about  him  when  Stan- 
ley comes.  I  mean,  be  careful  what  you  say." 

"  I  will — how  ?"  Mrs.  Yane  replied,  with 
prompt,  but  vague  acquiescence. 


UUAtVU. 


"  Don't  say  that  I  said  much  about  him." 

"  I  won't.  But  you  haven't  said  much  about 
him.  Of  course,  1  should  very  carefully  avoid 
saying  anything  that  could  make  Mr.  Villars 
uneasy." 

"It  wouldn't  make  him  'uneasy;'  it  isn't 
that ;  only  men  always  hate  to  have  an  adven- 
ture made  out  of  nothing,  and  a  hero  out  of  the 
same." 

"Oh,  I  understand,"  Mrs.  Vane  replied, 
"and  I'll  be  very  cautious."  Then.  Bella  felt 
that  her  aunt  overcautioned  would  be  thrice  as 
dangerous  as  her  aunt  cautioned  not  at  all 

So  it  came  to  pass  when  Stanley  Villars 
cursorily  alluded  to  the  subject  in  the  evening, 
that  Mrs.  Vane  fell  to  making  palpable  mys- 
teries about  portions  of  it,  acd.  Bella  began  to 
evince  nervousness.  Now  this  was  not  a  habit 
of  Miss  Vane's,  therefore  it  alone  would  have 
caused  Mr.  Villars  to  •  be  on  the  alert ;  but,  in 
addition,  Bella  laboriously  tried  to  conquer  her 
nervousness — to  hide  it  from  him,  and  seem  as 
she  had  been  before. 

"  I  suppose  Bella  has  told  you  all  her  adven- 
tures, Mrs.  Va"ne  ?"  he  said ;  and  Mrs.  Vane 
replied  that  "  Bella  had ;  but,  oh  dear  I  they 
were  not  worth  speaking  about,  she  could  as- 
sure him." 

"  There  I  differ  from  you.  When  a  young 
lady  loses  her  way  in  a  strange  country,  and 
then  falls  in  with  a  stranger  who  turns  out  to 
be  the  familiar  friend  of  her  own  familiar  friend, 
it  is  worth  speaking  about;  it's  a  prize  subject, 
in  fact — a  thing  that  you  may  not  hope  to 
have  happen  to  you  twice  in  your  life,  Bella." 

He  was  evidently  desirous  of  taking  a  semi- 
jocular  view  of  it.  He  was  clearly  above  suspi- 
cion. Bella  felt  better. 

"  Ah !  but  I'm  sure  Bella  wouldn't  wish  it  to 
happen  again,  Mr.  Villars;  she  would  much 
rather  have  had  you  there  to  take  care  of  her 
than  your  friend,  whatever  you  may  think." 

Mrs.  Vane  was  painfully  in  earnest  in  her 
vindication  of  her  niece,  and  her  niece  began  to 
experience  sensations  of  nervous  dread  of  what 
might  possibly  follow. 

"I  can  well  believe  that — still  a  change  is 
pleasant  sometimes ;  isn't  it,  Bella  ?" 

"Very.  Let  us  change  the  subject,"  Bella 
replied. 

"  I  don't  see  why  you  need  desire  to  change 
the  subject,  my  dear,"  the  amiable,  well-mean- 
ing old  lady  struck  in,  with  charming  simplici- 
ty; "there's  no  reason  for  it.  You  said  very 
little  about  Major  Walsingham,  and  thought 
very  little  about  him,  I'm  sure :  it  was  not  your 
fault  that  circumstances  threw  you  together  in 
a^pay  that  of  course  made  you  more  intimate  for 
the  time  being  than  mere  casual  acquaintances 
are  usually — not  your  fault  at  all." 

Mrs.  Vane  positively  beamed  as  she  spoke. 
It_  appeared  to  her  that  she  was  placing  the 
thing  in  the  most  agreeable  light  for  all  parties 
concerned. 

"Unquestionably  it  was  not  her  fault,"  Stan- 
ley Villars  replied,  stiffly. 

"Then  why  blame  her  for  it?"  Mrs.  Vane 
asked,  cheerily. 

"  Blame  her !  You  are  accusing  me  of  what 
I  should  never  have  presumed  to  do,  even  had 
cause  for  blame  existed,"  he  said,  quietly ;  but 
he  gave  a  quick,  passionately-interrogatory 


glance  at  Bella  as  he  spoke,  and  Bella  shudder- 
ed under  it. 

"  Pray,  Stanley,  don't  think  a  moment  longer 
about  such  nonsense,"  she  whispered. 

"  Don't  be  uncomfortable  then ;  if  you  don't 
blame  her,  don't  make  yourself  uncomfortable," 
the  good-natured  setter  to  rights  of  all  things 
that  were  wrong,  interposed,  affably.  "  Bella 
did  tell  me  not  to  say  a  word,  especially  about 
Major  Walsingham,  as  she  saw  you  were  un 
easy ;  and  I  wouldn't  have  said  a  word,  if  ] 
hadn't  seen  that  you  could  not  quite  get  ovei 
the  little  feeling,  whatever  it  might  be." 

"  Oh,  aunt,  you  make  things  worse  !  "  Bella 
cried,  indignantly. 

"  Uneasy !  make  things  worse  !  Good  God  I 
what  is  it  all  about  ? "  Stanley  ejaculated. 
"  What  made  you  request  your  aunt  not  to 
speak  of  my  friend  before  me,  Bella?  what 
reason  could  you  have  had  for  desiring  that 
silence  should  be  maintained  when  there  was 
no  cause  for  it  ?  " 

He  had  risen  from  his  seat  on  the  couch  by 
her  side,  and  was  walking  up  and  down  the 
length  of  the  room  as  he  spoke.  It  seemed  to 
Bella  that  there  was  more  anger  than  sorrow 
in  his  tone,  and  her  spirit  rose. 

"Aunt,  you  have  blundered  egregiously,  in 
common  with  the  rest  of  us,"  was  the  sole 
notice  Miss  Vane  took  of  his  questions. 

"  You  are  right ;  we  have  all  blundered  egre- 
giously," Mr.  Villars  exclaimed.  "  I  believed 
in  you  so  implicitly " 

"Believe  in  me  still,  Stanley,"  she  said,  very 
gently,  going  up  and  laying  her  hand  on  his 
arm ;  then  she  went  on  in  low,  caressing  ac- 
cents— "  because  I  am  excused  awkwardly 
before  I  am  accused  or  guilty,  are  you  going  to 
be  unjust  to  me  and  to  yourself?  " 

"  What  did  she  mean  by  that  nervous  anxi- 
ety to  clear  you  from  the  shadow  of  reproach 
before  it  had  fallen  upon  you,  Bella  ? " 

"I  don't  know — that  is,  I  do  know,  but " 

"You  would  rather  not  tell  me  ?  " 

"  Not  that,  but  I  hardly  know  how  to  tell 
you  in  such  a  way  as  will  make  you  fully 
appreciate  all  the  bearings  of  the  case  at  once." 
Then  she  paused  reflectively  for  a  minute,  and 
in  that  minute  she  arranged  her  speech,  and 
made  herself  believe  that  she  meant  it. 

"  I  know  so  well  the  dislike  you  have  to 
hearing  things  talked  up  and  made  much  of, 
and  I  felt  that  it  couldn't  be  pleasant  for  you 
to  feel  that  I  had  been  roving  about  late  at 
night  with  only  a  groom  ;  so  I  asked  aunt  not 
to  enlarge  upon  the  topic  when  you  came,  and 
as  a  reason  for  my  request  I  said  that  you 
would  not  care  to  hear  Major  Walsingham's 
name  mentioned  in  conjunction  with  mine  too 
often.  She  has  been  over  anxious  to  obey  me, 
and  has  done  the  very  thing  I  wanted  her  not 
to  do." 

"  Don't  plot  in  a  small  way  against  me, 
Bella.  Why  should  you  imagine  that  I  should 
be  annoyed  at  hearing  your  name  and  Claude's 
coupled  in  the  sole  way  they  can  be  coupled — 
as  far  as  I  know." 

"  I  didn't  think  you  would  care,"  she  whis- 
pered, "  I  only  said  so." 

"  Why  tell  stories  ?" 

"  Now  you  are  harsh  and  unjust :  besides,  I 
did  think  it,  in  a  measure — I  judged  by  myself; 


it  would  not  be  pleasant  for  me  to  hear  your 
name  coupled  with  any  other  woman's/' 

"Would  you  care?" 

"  Of  course  I  should,"  she  replied,  rather  ab- 
sently. She  had  made  her  peace  with  him,  she 
felt;  the  excitement  was  over,  and  now  she 
was  beginning  to  wonder  whether  the  game 
was  worth  the  candle — whether  the  prospect  of 
a  lasting  peace  was  pleasant  enough  to  pay  for 
the  trouble  that  had  been  given  her  to  make  it. 

One  thing,  certainly,  was  pleasant.  She  was 
proud  of  her  tact,  accustomed  to  receive  con- 
gratulations upon  it,  to  hear  that  it  was  perfect, 
and  to  be  told  that  it  was  of  a  quality  to  extri- 
cate her  from  any  difficulty.  She  liked  to 
bring  1t  into  play  on  the  smallest  emergency, 
and  was  rather  addicted  to  believing  that  she 
?et  things  right  that  had  never  been  wrong. 
But  this  had  been  a  genuine  occasion ;  for  Mrs. 
Vane's  well-intentioned  speeches  had  clearly 
rendered  Stanley  both  angry  and  distrustful. 
Then,  while  anger  and  distrust  were  young  and 
Justy  in  his  soul,  she  had  aired  and  exercised 
her  tact,  and  all  was  well  again  ! 

Outwardly,  all  was  well  again.  He  had  ap- 
peared to  accept  her  explanation  of  those  small 
reserves  which  were  to  have  been  observed ; 
and  she  knew  him  well  enough  to  feel  sure  that 
what  he  appeared  to  do,  he  did.  But  though 
she  had  forced  herself  to  believe  in  her  speech 
while  she  was  uttering  it,  she  began  to  doubt 
its  perfect -integrity  now  that  it  had  been  made 
and  accepted.  So,  though  all  was  well  out- 
wardly, all  was  not  well  inwardly ;  and  Bella 
Vane  had  a  conviction  that  this  "  would  grow." 

She  mooted  the  subject,  after  awhile,  of  Flo- 
rence's coming  to  stay  with  her  during  the 
remainder  of  her  visit  to  Denham.  "  You 
would  not  listen  to  a  proposal  I  made  the  other 
day,  Stanley,"  she  said,  "  but  I  shall  venture  to 
make  it  again.  Let  me  ask  your  sister  Flo- 
rence down  here ;  then,  when  I  go  to  them  in 
town,  I  shall  not  be  a  stranger  to  the  whole 
family." 

He  was  half  conscious  of  a  change  in  his  own 
sentiments  since  the  other  day,  respecting  this 
proposed  visit,  and  more  than  half  conscious  of 
the  cause  of  such  change. 

"  If  you  really  wish  her  to  come,"  he  began, 
dubiously. 

"  I  do,"  she  interrupted,  eagerly ;  u  I  am 
quite  sincere  in  it.  Let  her  come — let  her,  do !  " 

"  Certainly,  if  she  will.  "What  has  made  you 
set  your  heart  on  it  in  this  way  ?  " 

"I  hardly  know,"  she  replied,  with  an  in- 
crease of  colour.  She  had  one  of  those  faces 
whose  colour  is  always  increasing  or  decreas- 
ing. "  I  hardly  know.  I  am  sympathetic  with 
your  sister,  I  suppose." 

He  paused  in  silence  for  a  minute  or  two  ; 
then  he  said — 

"  Come  away  to  the  window,  where  what  I 
tell  you  won't  be  overheard."  So  she  went 
over  to  the  bay-window  with  him,  and  stood 
there,  looking  out  into  the  night,  listening  with 
beating  heart  and  throbbing  brow. 

"  I  am  not  quite  certain  that  we  shall  do  well 
in  getting  Florence  down  here,  Bella.  You 
have  seen  her,  though  you  don't  know  her  yet ; 
you  must  see  how  sensitive  she  is." 

"Well,"  was  all  the  answer  she  could  make ; 
she  was  feeling  painfully  that  the  identification 


of  himself  with  her  contained  in  that  sentence, 
"not  quite  certain  that  we,  shall  do  well,"  was 
grating  harshly  on  some  newly-strung  chords  in 
her  soul. 

"Well!  She  will  see  more  of  Claude  Wal- 
singham  than  will  be  '  well '  for  her,  perhaps, 
if  she  comes.  I  should  like  her  to  be  with 
you,  unquestionably,  but  it  may  turn  out  a 
dangerous  experiment  for  her." 

"  Why  ?  Let  her  come,  Stanley,"  she  plead- 
ed, "  let  her  come ;  let  them  meet  and  love 
each  other  if  they  will." 

She  was  struggling  fiercely  with  herself  at 
this  juncture,  and  it  seemed  to  her  that  Flo- 
rence's presence  would  materially  aid  her  in 
her  endeavour  to  do  what  was  right,  and 
honourable,  and  womanly. 

"  She  may  love  him,  but  he  will  never  care 
for  Florry  again,  I  fear,"  Stanley  said,  rather 
mournfully.  He  was  thinking  of  his  friend's 
infatuation  at  Eichmond  the  other  night.  Bella 
immediately  fancied  that  his  words  referred  to 
Claude's  dawning  admiration  for  herself.  Yet, 
if  they  did,  how  could  Stanley  bring  himself  to 
utter  them  ?  She  was  perplexed. 

"At  any  rate,  let  her  come  ;  good  may  come 
from  it — good  to  us  all  in  every  way,"  she  mur- 
mured. "I  am  so  much  alone  here,  you  know, 
Stanley,  and  I  shall  have  less  than  ever  to  do 
now  poor  Vengeance  has  gone  lame.  Do  let 
me  have  your  sister  for  the  few  weeks  I  shall 
be  here." 

"  Write  to  her  to-morrow,  if  you  will ;  she 
will  be  only  too  glad  to  come.  As  to  your 
riding,  though,  I  forgot  to  tell  you  that  Wal- 
singham  has  commissioned  me  to  offer  you  a 
mount,  as  you  would  find  some  difficulty  in  re- 
placing Vengeance  down  here." 

"  One  of  the  horses  he  drives  ?" 

"  Yes." 

"  I  shall  not  take  it ;  I  shall  not  like  to  de- 
prive him  of  it.  You  and  he  will  be  wanting  to 
drive  about  while  he  is  with  you,  and  I 
shouldn't  think  of  using  his  horse  after  he  has 
left." 

"  The  offer  only  held  good  for  while  he  was 
here,  my  dear  child.  I  do  not  believe  he  con- 
templated, for  one  instant,  leaving  the  horse 
with  you,"  Stanley  Villars  said,  laughing. 

Even  in  the  semi-darkness  of  that  bay  win- 
dow he  saw  the  blood  surge  up  to  her  face. 

"  It  would  not  be  so  much  for  him  to  do  for 
me,  after — after — "  She  stopped  abruptly ;  she 
had  commenced  in  a  ringing,  impetuous  tone, 
and  her  sudden  pause  sounded  strangely. 

"After  what?" 

"  Oh,  nothing !  After  having  been  your 
friend  for  so  many,  many  years,  I  was  going  to 
say,"  she  replied.  "There,  don't  let  us  speak 
about  horses  any  longer,  Stanley.  Vengeance's 
lameness  is  too  fresh  a  thing  for  me  to  be  calm 
on  the  subject  yet.  Let  us  talk  of  Florence — 
•js  she  clever?" 

"  Clever  enough  to  have  made  all  who  know 
her  love  her,"  he  replied,  fondly. 

"  Is  she  bright,  I  mean  ?" 

"  Perhaps  hardly,  in  your  sense  of  the 
word." 

"  What  do  you  take  to  be  '  my  sense  of  the 
word  ?'  " 

"  She  is  not  brilliant  and  flashing.  There  i.s 
a  great  deal  of  repose  in  her  soul ;  -  consequently 


ON  GUARD. 


there  is  a  great  deal  in  her  manner.  However, 
it  is  useless  to  attempt  to  describe  her ;  you'll 
lind  her  out  for  yourself?" 

"  She  would  be  just  the  right  sort  of  wife 
for  Major  Walsingham  then,  Stanley ;  for  there 
is  not  much  repose  in  either  his  soul  or  man- 
ner." 

"  I  tell  you  that  it  is  very  improbable  she 
will  ever  be  that  now,"  he  replied  impatiently. 
"  What  has  given  you  that  impression  of 
Claude,  I  wonder?  I  always  regard  him  as 
one  of  the  coolest  fellows  possible." 

"  He  may  be — oh  I  most  likely  he  is,"  she 
replied  carelessly;  "probably  he  was  put  out 
at  having  to  look  after  me,  and  guard  me  from 
evil  till  you  came.  The  fact  is,"  she  continued, 
turning  away  from  the  window,  and  burying 
herself  as  if  she  were  very  weary,  in  the  corner 
of  a  couch — "  the  fact  is,  I  felt  myself  bound  to 
make  '  acute  observations'  about  him,  as  I  had 
heard  so  much  of  him.  Observations  made 
under  supposed  compulsion  are  apt  to  be  rather 
wide  of  the  mark,  you  know." 

Soon  after  this  Mr.  Villars  took  his  leave,  in 
mercy  to  Bella,  "  who  must  be  worn  out,  and 
in  need  of  a  long  night's  rest,"  he  said.  In 
Bidding  her  good-night,  he  asked  her  for  a  rose, 
i  long  buff-rose,  which  she  had  worn  in  her 
aosom  all  the  night. 

"It  is  not  worth  giving,"  she  said,  placing 
ler  hand  on  it  resolutely — "  an  old,  worn,  faded 
lower,  indeed  !  No ;  you  shall  not  have  it.  I 
,vill  send  you  down  a  lot  of  them,  a  bouquet 
or  your  table,  before  breakfast  to-morrow 
norning." 

"Which  the  gardener  will  gather?  No, 
,hank  you.  I  want  this  one." 

"  Not  this  one ;  it  is  faded.  All  the  leaves 
svould  drop  off  before  you  reached  home ;  and 
t  would  look  so  imbecile  to  walk  in  with  a 
jtalk  and  some  withered  green  leaves  in  your 
3utton-hole." 

"  In  whose  eyes  would  it  look  imbecile  ?"  he 
isked.  But  Bella  would  not  tell  him,  so  he 
ivent  away  unsatisfied. 

Mr.  Villars  walked  home  rapidly.  He  took  a 
short  cut  through  the  rectory  grounds,  and 
icross  a  paddock  which  adjoined  that  rambling 
)ld  garden  through  whi^h  the  streamlet  ran. 
rhere  was  a  wooden  door  of  communication 
setween  garden  and  paddock,  of  which  he  had 
;he  key  in  his  pocket ;  so  he  admitted  himself 
juietly,  and  walked  along,  saying  to  himself — 

"  Eleven  o'clock !  Claude  will  have  bored 
limself,  and  gone  to  bed." 

He  reached  the  centre  of  the  garden  as  he 
said  this ;  and  looking  up,  preparatory  to  taking 
i  spring  across  the  water,  he  saw  Major  Wal- 
iingham  stretched  on  a  bench  on  the  opposite 
side. 

"  Hallo  1"  Stanley  cried  out:  "you  are  like 
Praed's  troubadour — you  lay  beside  a  rivulet, 
ind  look  beside  yourself." 

"I  think  I  am  beside  myself,"  Claude  an- 
iwered  jumping  up,  and  turning  to  walk  to  the 
louse  with  his  host;  "at  least  I  was  beside 
nyself  when  I  said  I  could  stay  here  for  a  time, 
^'d  forgotten  that  I  must  be  back  to-morrow." 

"Nonsense!" 

"  Fact — regimental  duties — not  to  be  disre- 
garded." 

"Look  here,  old  fellow,"  Stanley  said  affec- 


tionately; "for  heavens  don't  go  if  you  can 
possibly  remain.  I  shall  feel  that  there  is  some 
cause  for  your  departure  that  I  could  ill  bear 
to  exist.  Don't  go  if  you  can  stay." 

11  On  my  honour,  it  is  only  service  matters 
that  would  take  me  away,"  Claude  replied  con- 
fusedly. Then  he  suddenly  added — 

"  I  will  stay,  whatever  comes  of  it.  One  la 
apt  to  get  false  notions  when  alone  under  the 
moon,  you  know." 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

FLORENCE  COMES. 

THE  morning  after  these  events  occurred,  Miss 
Vane  sent  off  her  note  of  invitation  to  her  fu- 
ture sister-in-law.  She  made  it  very  brief  and 
kind.  I  will  leave  to  the  reader  to  decide 
whether  or  not  it  was  graceful.  I  deem  it  en- 
tirely in  keeping  with  her  character  myself. 

"  Thursday,  Denham. 
"My  dear  Florence"  (she  wrote), 

"  It  is  your  brother's  wish,  and  my  great 
desire,  that  you  should  spend  a  short  time  with 
me  down  here  at  my  uncle's.  Will  you  give  us 
this  pleasure  ?  and  will  you  commence  giving 
it  at  an  early  date — say  by  coming  the  day  after 
to-morrow,  if  possible?  That  will  give  us 
Sunday — always  an  idle  day — to  learn  as  much 
as  may  be  necessary  of  each  other. 

"  Yours  always  affectionately, 

"BELLA  VANE." 

She  glanced  her  eye  rapidly  over  the  last  line 
or  two  when  she  had  written  it,  and  said  to 
herself,  "  I  will  let  that  go  about  Sunday  being 
an  idle  day.  Perhaps  she  won't  like  it ;  she 
may  be  starchy;  but  I  will  let  it  go." 

So  she  let  it  go,  and  Florence,  who  was  far 
from  being  starchy,  saw  no  guile  in  that  simple 
statement  of  a  fact,  but  nevertheless  found  that 
she  could  not  get  away  from  town  before  the 
following  Monday,  "  when  I  will  be  at  Denham 
by  the  five  P.  M.  train,"  she  wrote. 

The  intervening  days  passed  slowly  to  Bella, 
and  wearily,  wearily  to  one  other  sojourner  in 
that  village.  Stanley  left  his  flock  to  attend  to 
their  own  salvation,  unaided  by  his  supervision, 
and  devoted  himself  to  the  entertainment  of  his 
friend.  But  the  entertainment  he  provided 
palled  upon  his  friend,  and  his  friend  was  power- 
less to  conceal  from,  him  that  it  did  so.  The 
days  dragged,  in  fact,  and,  fatal  comparison! 
the  evenings  were  dangerously  delightful. 

Dangerously  delightful  in  a  fitful  kind  of  way. 
The  two  young  men  were  always  with  the 
Vanes  in  the  evening,  and  the  elders  of  the 
Vanes  went  for  their  due  worth,  which  was  but 
little  in  the  estimation  of  the  visitors.  The 
girl  was  the  fountain-head  from  whence  emanat- 
ed all  that  was  pleasant,  and  the  girl  was  en- 
gaged to  one  of  the  men,  and  it  was  the  other 
one  who  felt  that  there  was  a  danger  in  the  de- 
light he  began  to  feel  in  her  presence :  that  sit- 
ting witli  her,  as  he  too  often  did,  in  the  half- 
light  of  the  warm,  soft  July  evenings,  contrasted 
with  fearful  pleasantness  with  the  long  opprea- 


40 


ON  GUARD. 


sive  mornings  he  spent  fishing  with  Stanley  ; 
for  Stanley  had  retained  this  single  sporting 
taste,  ar-d  would  carry  him  off  to  distant  streams 
that  had,  to  Claude's  sorrow,  a  reputation  for 
trout.  Now,  Claude  hated  fishing  with  a  line 
and  Qy,  from  the  bottom  of  his  soul.  It  was  to 
him  like  going  out  to  tea,  or  home  to  a  birthday 
feast,  or  any  other  inoffensive  and  tedious  pas- 
time. But  he  concealed  his  feelings  as  well  as 
he  could  from  every  one  (even  from  himself!), 
and  entirely  from  Stanley;  for  to  the  latter 
something  whispered  that  he  owed,  or  would 
owe,  all  of  reparation  that  was  in  his  power  to 
make. 

But  the  mornings  alone,  quite  alone,  with  the 
friend  of  his  youth  and  the  companion  of  his 
riper  years,  were  long,  and  dull,  and  void ;  and 
the  evenings  were  fleeting,  exciting,  and  full  of 
a  feeling  that  was  dear  to  his  heart  as  his  hopes 
of  heaven,  and  yet  he  cursed  his  fate  when  lie 
found  that  it  was  shared. 

The  Sunday,  the  day  that  she  had  termed 
<:  an  idle  day,"  came,  and  Stanley  was  all  the 
parish  priest  again,  as  was  meet  and  well. 
While,  as  for  Bella,  she  was  all  her  own  rebel- 
lious, undecided  self — that  was  all.  Duly  she 
suffered  more  than  people  to  whom  it  is  given 
to  be  wise  on  all  occasions,  and  alwayf  to  know 
what  they  mean,  can  readily  imagine. 

Once  more  she  went  down  to  the  schoolroom, 
but  there  was  less  heart  in  her  effort  on  this 
than  on  the  former  occasion.  "  I  will  try  while 
I  can,  but  I  shall  never  succeed,"  she  said  to 
herself  when  she  came  to  the  door;  "but  I 
will  try,  for  his  sake." 

She  did  try :  she  tried  to  do  what  was  in  the 
path  of  what  Stanley  had  declared  to  be  her 
duty,  and  what  she  told  herself  would  be  her 
duty  all  her  life  if  she  married  him,  and  the 
effort  made  her  faint  and  weary — with  a  i'aint- 
ness  and  weariness  that  but  a  short  month 
since  she  had  fancied  she  could  not  feel  on  the 
treadmill,  provided  only  that  Stanley  was  with 
her:  with  a  faintness  and  weariness  that  she 
knew  must  deepen,  for  she  could  not  battle  with 
it  even  now  that  it  was  so  young  a  thing,  and 
that  would,  therefore,  finally  overcome  and  beat 
her  down. 

She  could  not  battle  with  it ;  and  he,  sitting 
there  piloting  his  own  class  through  the  intri- 
cacies of  the  gospel  for  the  day,  saw  that  she 
could  not  battle  with  it,  and  that  it  was  mental 
more  than  physical.  Then  a  sharp  pang  assail- 
ed him  at  the  sight,  and  he  prayed  a  passionate 
prayer  that  a  certain  bitter  cup,  now  faintly 
outlined,  might  be  suffered  to  pass  away  from 
him.  For  he  loved  this  woman  well! 

That  day  passed  "  much  as-  usual,"  Bella 
would  have  said  had  she  been  asked  about  it; 
but  no  one  asked  her,  therefore  she  Was  spared 
the  utterance  of  the  story.  In  truth,  it  did  not 
pass  as  ordinary  Sundays  had  passed  at  Den- 
ham  since  her  advent ;  for  there  was  turmoil  in 
the  breasts  of  all  three  when  they  came  to- 
gether— turmoil  that  would  not  be  toned  down. 

Once  more— late  on  that  Sunday  night — 
Claude  made  one  more  attempt  to  do  what  was 
just. 

"  Don't  take  it  amiss,  old  fellow,"  he  said  to 
Stanley,  "  but  really  I  ought  to  go  away — that 
is,  I  ought  to  go  back  to  town  to-morrow." 

Then  Stanley  combated  this  resolution  with 


all  the  power  of  eloquence  he  had  in  him.  He 
partly  fathomed  |he  motive  of  it,  and  even  to 
himself  (spasmodically  unhappy  as  he  had  been 
this  day)  he  would  not  allow  that  there  could 
be  danger  to  any  of  them  in  a  prolongation  of 
Claude's  visit.  How  should  there  be,  indeed, 
if  Bella  were  faithful,  and  Claude  honourable, 
and  he  himself  worthy  of  being  dealt  honestly 
by  ?  He  would  not  doubt  or  distrust  even  them 
or  himself;  he  would  rely  on  the  woman  who 
had  vowed  to  love  him,  and  on  the  man  who 
had  never  lied  to  him,  and  all  would  be  well. 

So  he  urged  Claude  to  remain — urged  him 
heartily:  told  him,  with  apparent  unconscious- 
ness, that  Florence  was  coming  to  stay  with 
Miss  Vane,  and  that  then,  as  there  would  be 
two  ladies,  they  could  go  for  wonderful  drives 
behind  those  matchless  iron-gr-eys.  "  You  will 
cut  off  our  chief  hopes  of  happiness  if  you  go, 
Claude.  You  will  indeed.  Don't  think  of  go- 
ing yet:  I  won't  hear  of  it,"  he  said;  and 
Claude,  after  one  brief  protest,  succumbed  to 
his  fate  and  his  friend,  and  agreed  to  stay. 

Florence  was  to  come  by  the  five  p.  if.  train, 
and  Bella  proposed  that,  to  obviate  aught  like 
embarrassment  or  ceremony,  they  should  "all 
walk  up  to  the  station  in  procession  to  meet 
her."  "It  will  be  a  delightful,  refreshing, 
wholesome  little  bit  of  exercise  after  the  rail- 
way journey,"  she  said,  "  and  will  show  her  that 
her  advent  is  a  welcome  thing  indeed." 

"  I  suppose  Miss  Vane's  whim  must  be  grati- 
fied," Claude  had  said  to  Stanley  when  he 
heard  of  the  plan,  "but  it  strikes  me  as  absurd. 
Much  better  send  the  Vanes'  carriage  for  your 
sister,  Stanley.  Florry  won't  care  for  this  sort 
of  triumphal  entry." 

"  Oh,  I  don't  know,  we  may  as  well  walk 
up,"  Stanley  answered.  He  was  blindly  ac- 
quiescent in  all  Bella's  schemes  at  this  period, 
and  Bella  marked  the  change  in  him,  and  knew 
sorrowfully  well  the  cause  of  it.  He  would 
keep  her  at  any  cost  to  himself,  she  saw. 
"Would  he  keep  her  at  any  cost  tor  her  ? 

Four  of  them  set  out  to  meet  Florry.  Solemn- 
faced  Rock  was  the  fourth,  and  he  was  a  wel- 
come addition,  for  whenever  one  of  the  party 
found  a  difficulty  in  either  speaking  or  keeping 
silence,  his  or  her  gloves  could  be  thrown  over 
the  hedge  for  Rock  to  fetch,  and  as  Rock  inva- 
riably packed  away  all  articles  that  he  retrieved 
in  the  back  of  his  throat,  these  proceedings  kept 
their  hands  occupied,  and  their  minds  too,  in  a 
measure. 

They  stood  upon  the  little  platform,  the 
boarded  back  of  which  had  no  advertisements 
hung  upon  it  which  might  amuse  the  expectant, 
and  waited  for  the  train.  "When  it  came  up, 
and  a  blooming  face,  with  a  radiant  smile  upon 
it,,  beamed  upon  them  from  the  window,  Bella 
put  her  hand  hurriedly  on  Mr.  Villars'  arm,  and 
then,  instead  of  approaching  the  carriage,  turned 
to  look  at  Claude,  and  mark  the  effect  of  that 
blooming,  beaming  face  upon  him. 

He  had  stepped  forward  to  open  the  door  and 
give  her  his  hand  to  help  her  out.      Such   at 
least  had  been  his  design  when  he  stepped  for- 
ward, but  he  checked  it  when  Bella  turned  to 
look  at  him.     Checked  it,  and  suffered  Florry's 
brother  to  pass  him ;  and  Florry  saw  that  he  so\( 
checked  himself,  and  felt  that  "but  the  other  '(, 
day  Claude  would  have  been  first." 


ON  GUARD. 


41 


Before  Florence  could  speak  to  Claude,  or 
indeed  think  of  him  further,  Miss  Yane  had 
recollected  herself,  and  many  other  things.  She 
went  up  to  the  new  arrival  with  a  pretty  ges- 
ture of  greeting,  in  which  both  her  hands  and 
her  head,  and  in  fact  her  whole  slender,  grace- 
ful figure,  bore  a  part.  ""We  met  in  London 
without  knowing  each  other,  dear,"  she  said ; 
"but  we  shall  know  each  other  well  soon,  I 
hope."  Then  she  kissed  Florence,  and  saw  that 
she  was  very  pretty;  after  quite  a  different 
pattern  of  beauty,  though,  to  her  own. 

"I  had  no  idea  that  I  should  find  Claude 
here,"  Florry  said,  when  she  had  responded  to 
Miss  Vane.  "When  did  you  come,  Claude?" 
she  continued,  turning  to  him  and  giving  him 
her  hand. 

"I  have  been  here  several  days.  Did  they 
not  tell  you?" 

She  shook  her  head.  "  No.  Why  didn't  you 
mention  it,  Stanley?" 

"Simply  because  I  have  not  written  to  you 
since  he  came,"  Stanley  answered. 

"  And  I  did  not,  simply  because  when  I  wrote 
I  forgot  it,  I  suppose,"  Bella  said,  lightly. 
"Come  on,  Florence,  we  are  going  to  walk 
home  if  you  have  no  objection." 

"Whether  she  has  any  objection  or  not,  it 
seems  to  me,  since  there  is  no  carriage  here," 
Claude  interposed. 

Then,  of  course,  Florence  protested  that  she 
should  delight  in  being  compelled  to  walk  a 
mile,  and  that  she  was  not  a. bit  tired,  and  that 
it  was  just  the  very  thing  that  was  most  pleasant, 
Ac.  All  of  which  they  affected  to  believe,  as 
becomes  well-bred  hypocrites,  and  inwardly  dis- 
trusted. 

Rock  was  not  so  essential  to  their  well-being 
on  their  homeward  journey.  There  were  four 
without  Rock  now,  and  four  is  a  very  pleasant 
number  under  certain  conditions.  So  Rock, 
being  superfluous,  and  feeling  the  same,  jogged 
along  by  the  side  of  the  one  who  was  least 
likely  to  make  manifest  to  any  living  thing  that 
it  was  so  (superfluous),  and  that  one  was  Stan- 
ley Villars. 

They  came  out  four  abreast  into  the  high-road 
from  off  the  railway-station  yard,  and  for  at 
least  a  hundred  yards  they  kept  up  an  unbroken 
stream  of  talk  and  an  unbroken  line.  Then  it 
occurred  to  Bella  that  to  cross  the  fields  would 
be  pleasanter  than  to  keep  along  the  dusty 
highway,  "if  Florry  didn't  mind  stiles." 

Florry  was  amenable  ifc  mediately  to  any 
alteration,  whether  great  or  small,  in  their  route. 
So  they  stopped  at  the  entrance  to  a  field-path, 
and  looked  at  it  in  the  dubious  way  people  are 
apt  to  look  when  it  is  over  a  tall  stile  which 
has  but  one  step,  and  that  one  very  near  its 
summit. 

As  may  be  supposed,  however,  they  sur- 
mounted it.  Naturally  they  would  do  so  in  the 
pages  of  this  book,  whatever  they  might  do  in 
real  life ;  I  being  desirous  of  getting  them  into 
the  field,  enter  it  they  must.  They  surmounted 
it  as  creditably  as  women  may  hope  to  do  in 
the  garb  of  the  present  day.  They  neither 
fractured  their  bones  on  the  single  step,  nor  their 
dresses.  But  when  they  walked  on  again,  it 
was  to  be  perceived  that  something  was 
fractured,  and  that  something  was  the  line, 
"  four  abreast,"  which  they  had  hitherto  kept. 


The  field-path  was  narrow,  and  they  walked 
along  it  two  and  two,  and  the  two  that  walked 
first  were  Stanley  Villars  and  his  sister  Florry. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

AN   OLD   STORY. 

"  STANLEY,  I  like  her  so  much." 

"  I  thought  you  would  like  her,  Florry.  Ah ! 
but  you  don't  know  her  yet ;  you  will  like  her 
by-and-by." 

"  What  does  Claude  say  about  it  all,  Stan- 
ley ?"  She  asked  this  rather  hesitatingly,  and 
with  a  confused  expression  of  countenance. 
Claude's  disapprobation,  as  manifested  that 
sultry  afternoon  in  her  mother's  drawing-room, 
had  been  a  disheartening  and  a  terrible  thing. 
But  now  she  was  drifting  under  Stanley's  in- 
fluence, and  it  was  disheartening  to  think  what 
he  might  feel  about  Claude's  disapprobation. 

"  Say  about  it  all,  my  dear  child  I  He  ad- 
mires her  very  much ;  but  it  is  not  even  for 
Claude  to'  say  anything  about  her.  I  am  very 
glad  that  }rou  are  come,  dear,"  he  added,  kindly, 
for  he  saw  that  Florry  was  abashed  by  the 
veiled  reproof  he  had  administered  to  her  in 
regard  to  Claude's  possible  opinions. 

Florence  was  looking  not  so  much  abashed  as 
low-spirited.  She  walked  along  the  field-path 
with  a  very  material  decrease  of  that  spring  and 
elasticity  which  had  marked  her  step  when 
they  were  walking  four  abreast.  On  the  faco 
of  it,  it  was  the  reverse  of  what  "should  have 
been,"  this  progress  home  of  theirs.  The 
brother  and  sister  were  attached  to  each  other, 
but  their  attachment  was  not  of  that  ardent 
nature  which  makes  other  loves  and  anxieties 
seem  of  little  worth  in  comparison.  Each  knew 
that  the  other  had  a  dearer  interest  in  life  than 
him  or  herself.  Each  saw  that  the  dearer  in- 
terest elected  to  remain  behind  with  another  on 
this  occasion,  which  was  perplexing. 

They  were  all  going  to  dine  at  the  rectory 
that  night,  and  the  rectory  dinner  had  been 
deferred  for  an  hour  in  order  to  favour  this 
walking  home  scheme,  which  had  fallen  short  of 
being  the  gay,  enlivening  thing  it  was  intended 
to  be.  The  order  of  procession  which  I  describ- 
ed as  being  theirs  when  they  got  over  the  stile, 
was  religiously  observed  during  the  rest  of  the 
way,  and  it  was  not  the  order  of  procession 
that  Stanley  Villars  had  contemplated  when  he 
had  acceded  to  Bella's  request  that  they  should 
all  walk  up  to  meet  Florry. 

There  had  been,  after  that  brief  discussion 
about  Miss  Vane,  a  little  family  talk  between 
the  brother  and  sister.  Georgina's  marriage 
prospects  had  been  alluded  to  in  the  calm,  dis- 
passionate way  such  unexceptionable,  but  by 
no  means  brilliant  prospects  would  be  alluded 
to,  and  then  they  spoke  of  the  elder  brother, 
Gerald,  and  of  Gerald's  wife. 

"  I  hear  of  your  being  with  her  frequently  in 
these  days,"  Stanley  Villars  said,  in  relation  to 
the  reigning  Lady  Villars. 

"  Yes,. we  are  with  her  a  great  deal ;  she  is 
very  kind,  you  know,  Stanley." 

"By  Jove!  kind!" 

"Well,  I    mean  that  she  is  much  nicer — I 


ON  GUARD. 


mean  different — to  what  she  was  at  first. 
Gerald  is  always  the  same,  you  know." 

The  younger  brother  laughed.  "  Gerald  was 
always  a  good  fellow ;  but  latterly  there  has 
been  an  air  over  him  of  scarcely  feeling  that  he 
belongs  to  himself;  at  least  I  have  remarked  it 
whenever  I  have  seen  him.  Is  he  so  usually  ?" 

"I  don't  know  that  it's  that,"  Florence  re- 
plied ;  and  she  looked  puzzled. 

"  What  have  you  thought  '  it '  then,  Florry  ? 
You  seem  to  have  noticed  something." 

"  "Why,  he  is  dreadfully  afraid  of  putting 
Carrie  out,  you  know." 

Stanley  laughed,  and  the  colour  rose  to  his 
forehead. 

"Dear  old  Gerald!  so  he  is,"  he  said  warmly. 
"  I  wish  with  all  my  heart  '  Carrie '  were  not 
put  out  so  readily.  Does  she  bring  her  nerves 
to  bear  upon  him  as  often  as  ever  ?" 

Florence  shook  her  head.  "Worse  than 
ever ;  and  so  much  depends  upon  her  keeping 
well,  that  we  can't  wonder  at  Gerald  giving 
way  to  her  in  everything." 

"So  much,  indeed,"  Stanley  replied  gravely  ; 
and  then  they  changed  the  subject,  for  a  little 
nephew,  Sir  Gerald's  only  son,  had  died  but  a 
year  before,  and  there  was  no  successor  to  him 
yet. 

The  pair  behind  had  no  such  conversational 
safetj'-valves,  no  such  neutral  ground  on  which 
to  meet.  They  had  fallen  into  this  line  of 
march  unintentionally,  and  had  it  not  been  for 
a  wholesome  dread  of  looking  awkward,  they 
would  both  of  them  have  broken  it  at  once. 
But  the  dread  of  doing  aught  with  design  that 
might  be  apparent,  and  so  provoke  suspicion, 
was  upon  them  strongly— ^-more  strongly  than 
the  dread  of  something  else  which  was  upon 
them  too. 

For  awhile  they  walked  in  the  wake  of  Stan- 
ley and  his  sister  without  a  word.  Presently 
the  silence  grew  irksome.  Naturally  the  wo- 
man was  the  first  to  break  it. 

To  break  it  with  a  little  sentence — a  few 
short  words — a  brief  series  of  subdued  tones, 
that  would  have  been  as  nothing  had  they 
sounded  on  the  ears  of  the  great  majority.  The 
mischief  was  that  they  fell  on  the  ears  of  the 
one  who  could  interpret'  them  aright. 

"  It  was  my  wish  that  Florry  should  come. 
Did  you  know  that  ?" 

He  nodded,  and  then  again  for  a  few  yards 
they  walked  along  without  speaking. 

"How  heavy  the  air  is,"  she  said,  abruptly. 
"  Major  Walsingham,  do  you  know  that  I  think 
we  shall  have  a  thunder-storm." 

He  looked  up  at  the  sky — at  the  cloudless  blue 
sky — in  which  no  trace  of  a  coming  storm  was 
to  be  read.  Then  he  glanced  down  to  her  and 
replied,  "  I  think  so  too.  Do  you  know  that  I 
wanted  to  leave  Denham  to-day?" 

"  No ;  did  you  ?     And  Stanley  said ?" 

"That  he  wished  me  to  remain,  that  was 

all,"  he  answered.  "Are  you "he  was 

going  to  ask  was  she  "  glad  or  sony  "  that  he 
had  waived  his  resolution,  and  remained.  But 
good  feeling  intervened,  and  he  paused.  It 
would  have  beeu  worse  than  unfair  to  his 
friend,  he  felt,  to  hold  himself  up  as  am  object 
for  which  gladness  or  sorrow  was  to  be  expe- 
rienced by  this  girl  who  was  so  prompt  with 
either  sentiment. 


"  Am  I  what  ?"  she  asked. 

"  Are  you  tired  ?  these  fields  are  hard  walk- 
ing." 

"  That  is  not  what  you  were  going  to  say," 
she  retorted  with  true  feminine  pertinacity. 
"Tell  me  what  it  was." 

"I  really  forget,  Miss  Vane." 

"No,  you  do  not.  I  see  you  don't  forget. 
Say  it  to  me  ;  tell  me,  won't  you  ?" 

She  said  "  tell  me,  won't  you  ?"  in  small 
pleading  accents  that  vibrated  to  his  soul ;  but 
he  would  not,  and  his  perseverance  in  keeping 
back  that  imagined  speech  did  more  harm  than 
the  speech  itself  could  possibly  have  wrought. 

For  she  clothed  it  with  an  importance  that  it 
never  could  have  possessed  had  it  been  uttered. 
She  deemed  that  it  must  be  something  very 
touching,  very  tender,  very  everything  that  it 
ought  not  to  be  when  made  by  him  to  her.  So 
she  looked  up  at  him  half  fearfully,  and  then 
gazed  away  into  the  bloomy  haze  that  was 
hanging  lovingly  over  the  golden  corn  in  the 
distance.  Gazed  away  with  eyes  that,  despite 
their  earnestness,  saw  not  that  upon  which 
they  looked. 

For  Bella  was  thinking— thinking  seriously 
of  how,  after  all,  she  was  only  one  among 
many  who  have  made  mistakes,  and  who  must 
abide  by  the  mistakes  they  have  made,  and 
seem  to  be  happy  in  such  continuance.  For 
she  was  determined  to  abide  and  continue  in 
hers,  if  it  were  one  at  this  period.  She  wasS 
not  prepared  to  quit  the  web  and  leave  the 
loom,  and  take  those  fatal  three  paces,  and  com- 
pass that  destruction  which  the  Sir  Lancelots. 
who  ride  by  so  gaily  dight,  are  apt  to  bring  to 
pass. 

But  still  his  uttered,  and,  worse  still,  his  un- 
uttered  words  sank  into*  her  soul,  and  filled  it 
with  a  great  delight,  that  she  knew  it  would 
soon  be  a  sin  to  experience. 

There  was  a  better  division,  or  rather  a  far 
more  satisfactory  amalgamation,  of  the  party 
that  night.  The  two  men  lounged  outside  the 
open  window  and  smoked  cigars ;  and  the  two 
girls  sang  to  them  till  it  grew  dark.  Then 
they  all  gathered  round  the  table  and  took  tea, 
and  talked  on  familiar  topics  until  ease  resumed 
his  sway.  Florence  mentioned  having  seen 
Claude  down  at  Eichmond,  with  a  blithe  un- 
concern that  robbed  the  mention  of  all  bitter- 
ness to  him ;  and  Stanley,  marking  how  fond 
Claude  evidently  was  of  Florry,  in  a  quiet,  half- 
fraternal  way,  hop^il  that  much  good  would 
ensue  from  this  meeting  at  dull  Denham.  ^ 

"  What  shall  we  do  to-morrow  ?"  is  invariably 
the  question  raised  by  temporary  denizens  in  a 
country  place  before  separating  for  the  night. 
It  is  imperative  on  those  who  would  not  die  of 
the  dulness  of  it  (unless  one  is  quite  alone, 
when  Time  always  takes  care  of  himself)  to 
map  out  a  certain  plan  for  the  disposition  of 
the  next  twelve  daylight  hours.  They  felt 
this,  and  therefore  decided  that  they  would  go 
for  a  long  drive  in  Claude's  trap,  and  look  at  an 
old  hall,  the  show-place  of  the  county,  by  way 
of  getting  over  the  day,  and  duly  fatiguing 
themselves. 

Then  they  parted ;  and  after  they  were  gone 
up  to  their  rooms,  Bella  went  in  and  listened  to 
a  long  exposition  from  Florence  of  the  pleasure 
this  engagement  of  her's  (Bella's)  with  Stanley 


ON  GUARD. 


43 


was  to  the  whole  Yillara  family.  At  hearing 
which  Bella  was  very  grateful  and  very  sad. 

Claude's  trap  was  just  the  thing  for  the 
country.  Of  this  there  could  be  no  doubt. 
More  than  that,  it  was  the  only  thing  for  two 
gentlemen  and  two  ladies  to  go  out  in.  For  in 
a  phaeton — the  ordinary  "four-wheel" — the 
ladies  are  lost  to  view,  and  often  to  memory 
also,  in  the  seat  of  honour,  deprived  of  the 
society  of  both  their  cavaliers.  In  the  order  of 
things,  when  a  man  coaches  his  own  cattle,  his 
friend  sits  on  the  box  by  his  side  to  see  how  he 
does  it. 

These  dog-carts  were  well  enough  when  they 
first  came  in ;  but,  after  all,  a  lady's  voluminous 
drapery  suffers  sadly  in  one  of  them.  Besides, 
the  occupants  of  the  back  seats  are  in  such  a 
precarious  position,  that  their  enjoyment  of  the 
scenery  through  which  they  pass,  and  of  the 
ideas  evoked  by  that  scenery  in  the  minds  of 
those  in  front,  who  have  not  to  hold  on  all  the 
time,  is  but  ghastly.  No,  mere  dog-carts  are 
very  well  for  mere  men  and  dogs,  but  locomo- 
tives of  the  same  order  as  Claude's  are  the  only 
things  for  country  driving  when  two  ladies  are 
of  the  party. 

You  sat  back  to  back  in  it,  as  you  do  in  the 
ordinary  dog-cart ;  but  the  hind  seat  of  this  trap 
was  broad  arid  wide,  and  the  foot-shelf  projected 
afar,  in  a  curve  of  beauty  and  comfort  that  was 
agreeable  to  look  upon  as  well  as  pleasant  to 
use.  It  was  hung  low,  too,  this  vehicle,  which 
looked  like  a  phaeton  in  front,  it  had  such  a 
liberal  allowance  of  seat  and  dasher,  such  grace- 
fully sloping  wings,  and  such  an  utter  absence 
of  anything  angular  or  sporting  about  it.  It 
showed  the  horses  off  wonderfully  too,  which 
was  not  one  of  its  least  charms,  and  its  wheels 
were  so  close  together,  that  it  skimmed  over  the 
ground  in  the  wake  of  the  two  horses  lightly 
as  a  swallow. 

There  was  a  momentary  hesitation  as  to  how 
they  should  dispose  of  themselves  in  it,  when 
Claude  drove  up  to  the  door  that  morning. 
"Which  of  you  girls  will  get  up  in  front  with 
Claude?"  Stanley  had  asked  with  affected  un- 
concern, and  Bella  had  replied,  "  Oh !  Florry 
will,"  and  Florry  had  mildly  hinted,  "Won't 
Bella  Stanley  ?"  But  when  they  had  said  that, 
they  were  no  further  on  than  they  had  been 
before,  and  it  was  left  for  Claude  to  make 
events  march. 

"  Good  morning,  Miss  Yane,"  he  said,  lifting 
his  hat,  " good  morning,  Florry;  I  always  make 
both  my  sisters  get  up  behind  when  I  drive 
them.  It's  the  best  arrangement,  I  think,  and 
it  balances  the  cart  better." 

He  had  never  driven  either  of  his  sisters  in 
this  trap  yet,  or  any  other  woman  for  that  mat- 
ter ;  but  this  was  a  very  white  lie.  He  did  not 
care  to  have  Florry  up  with  him,  and  he  did 
not  dare  to  have  Bella. 

The  day  was  fine,  and  the  greys  were  fresh 
and  the  pace  fast.  There  is  something  in  mov- 
ing very  quickly  through  the  air  behind  horses 
that  imparts  a  glow  to  the  spirits.  Perhaps  it 
is  that  electricity  conveys  a  something  from  the 
inferior  animals — who  neither  lie  nor  plot,  nor 
mingle  sordid  with  the  majority  of  their  bet- 
ter motives— to  the  nobler  animal,  who  do 
all  these  things.  However  that  may  be,  the 
fact  remains  that  he  must  be  in  an  evil  case  in- 


deed whose  spirits  do  not  rejoice,  if  but  tempo- 
rarily, when  being  whirled  along  at  the  rate  of 
twelve  or  fourteen  miles  an  hour. 

The  horses  being  entirely  new  to  the  rest, 
and  nearly  new  to  Claude,  were  a  vast  boon, 
in  that  they  gave  them  -so  much  to  talk  about. 
They  had  first  to  mark  how  cleverly  the  greys 
stepped  together,  and  then  to  remark  upon  this 
fact  according  to  their  various  lights.  Then 
Bella,  from  her  position  behind,  would  glance 
at  their  gallant  method  of  going,  between  the 
forms  of  the  two  men,  and  proceed  to  make 
brilliant  discoveries  relative  to  one  or  other 
grey  "  shirking  his  work "  and  not  "  pulling 
up,"  which  discoveries  resulted  in  Stanley  being 
compelled  to  get  down  and  take  the  offender 
up  a  hole  or  two,  and  brought  condign  punish- 
ment from  Claude's  hand  once  or  twice  on  an 
entirely  innocent  horse. 

Rollescourt  was  their  bourn  this  day,  and 
they  reached  it  about  one  o'clock.  Near  all 
notorious  show-places  there  is  an  inn,  in 
which  the  weary  who  come  to  look  upon  the 
beauties  of  nature  or  art  can  take  sustenance  to 
keep  up  their  stamina.  Accordingly  they  found 
one  here— the  "  Park  Inn,"  it  was  called ;  and 
at  the  "  Park  Inn  "  they  spent  a  pleasant  hour 
in  having  luncheon,  and  wishing  that  the  show- 
house  was  not  so  roomy,  as  they  learnt  from  a 
loquacious  waiter  that  it  was. 

A  terribly  grand  old  mansion  this  Rollescourt 
House  was,  it  seemed  to  them,  as  they  walked 
up  a  wide  avenue  and  came  directly  out  against 
its  frowning  massive  front — a  house  that  might 
well  have  been  the  prison  of  a  monarch  of  the 
Titans,  but  that  would  never  have  been  selected 
even  by  him  as  his  residence  in  happier  mo- 
ments of  freedom. 

Up  a  broad  flight  of  steps  and  into  a  large 
vaulted  hall,  in  which  there  was  nothing  to  bo 
seen  but  si^e,  but  which  nevertheless  had  to  be 
looked  at  with  marked  interest  by  all  who  as- 
pired to  doing  the  place  properly.  There  they 
were  compelled  to  wait  for  a  few  minutes  while 
the  servant  who  had  admitted  them  made  a 
feint  of  going  away  into  other  regions  to  learn 
whether  or  riot  it  was  the  good  will  of  the 
housekeeper  to  come  forward  and  graciously 
guide  them.  This  ceremony  lost  what  would 
otherwise  have  been  imposing  about  it,  through 
the  fact  of  the  visitors  detecting  the  house- 
keeper anxiously  peering  at  them  through  a 
little  door  to  the  left. 

Eventually  they  were  ushered  through  this 
same  little  door  into  an  apartment  called  the 
"small  prayer  room,"  and  the  housekeeper's 
presence.  She  was  not  the  ideal  housekeeper 
of  a  grand  old  castellated  building.  She  did 
not  stalk  in  rustling  black  silk  and  the  conscious 
majesty  of  being  the  chief  retainer  of  a  lordly 
house,  which  she  alone  had  the  power  to  show. 
On  the  contrary,  she  waddled  wearily  before 
them,  as  one  who  had  done  this  same  thing  so 
many  times  for  so  many  people,  and  seen  the 
folly  of  it,  would  be  apt  to  do  in  real  life. 

"  Why  the  '  little  prayer  room  ?'  "  Claude 
asked,  when  the  housekeeper  had  introduced  it 
by  name.  It  seemed  a  misnomer  certainly. 
The  adornments  were  not  of  a  devotional  cast, 
unless  the  house  of  Rollescourt  was  in  the  habit 
of  offering  up  prayers  and  thanksgivings  to  a 
portrait;  of  the  restorer  of  the  mansion,  Sir 


44 


ON  GUARD. 


George  Rolles — or  to  an  inefficient  representa- 
tion of  the  Godolphin  Arabian,  who  was  curvet- 
ing about  on  a  large  square  of  canvas  in  a  mar- 
vellous manner. 

"There  is  a  chapel,  which  will  be  entered 
from  the  left  when  the  visitors  have  passed 
through  the  saloon  and  yellow  drawing-room," 
the  housekeeper  replied,  in  a  tone  that  told  them 
the  nomenclature  of  the  rooms  was  not  to  be 
idly  questioned. 

"  They  said  their  little  prayers  here,  and  kept 
the  chapel  for  their  big  ones,  perhaps,"  Bella 
whispered,  suggestively.  "  What  an  old-fashion- 
ed horse  he  is!"  she  added,  pointing  to  the  fa- 
mous Arabian.  "  We  shouldn't  think  much  of 
him  in  these  days,  should  we?" 

"  No ;  we  have  improved  our  breed  of  horses, 
and  our  breed  of  men  too,  apparently.  Look  at 
the  great  gun,  Sir  George  himself:  his  features 
all  sit  in  the  middle  of  his  face,  huddled  up  to- 
gether in  a  most  ignominious  manner ;  yet  he 
was  a  prime  minister  and  a  great  architect." 

The  familiar  sound  of  the  list  of  Sir  George's 
greatnesses  caught  the  housekeeper's  ear,  and 
she  immediately  struck  in — 

"He  commenced  restoring  the  mansion  in 
17 — ,  and  it  was  finally  completed  as  now  seen 
by  the  visitor  in  1856,  by  his  great-grandson. 
Every  door  in  the  house  is  double,  and  is  of 
mahogany,  as  are  the  sashes  of  all  the  win- 
dows." 

They  said,  "Really  now!"  and  "Ah,  indeed!" 
in  answer  to  this ;  and  then,  having  taken  their 
preliminary  canter,  and  warmed  to  their  work, 
went  at  full  trot  through  about  twenty  rooms, 
till  a  chaotic  mass  of  ideas — gleaned  from  faded 
tapestry,  colossal  velvet  beds,  gloomy  portraits, 
interminable  flights  of  stairs,  gaunt  furniture  in 
ghastly  shrouds,  and  marks  of  royal  satisfaction, 
in  the  shape  of  flowered  satins  and  false  like- 
nesses of  themselves,  that  royal  gu^ts  had  left 
— oppressed  their  minds. 

It  was  oppressive  altogether — oppressive  from 
its  magnitude — oppressive  from  its  wealth  of 
art,  from  its  poverty  of  life,  from  its  grandeur 
and  its  gloom,  its  beauty  and^  its  barrenness — 
oppressive  from  the  superbness  of  that  solitude 
which  could  not  be  destroyed  by  such  morsels 
of  humanity  as  they  felt  themselves  to  be  in  it ; 
above  all,  oppressive  from  its  inutility.  I  am 
cursed  with  the  modern  mind,  and  I  feel  with 
my  puppets  here.  They  mov-ed  sadly  through 
these  long,  solitary  rooms,  and  listened  sadly  to 
the  tale  their  guide  told  of  how  "  the  family  " 
had  never  made  this  grand  old  place  their  home 
— how  they  had  not  even  resided  there  tempo- 
rarily— for  upwards  of  fifty  years.  Half  a  cen- 
tury's desertion  of  a  temple,  on  the  part  of  those 
whose  ancestors  had  lavished  all  that  was  their 
own,  and  much  that  was  not  their  own,  in  its 
adornment !  Fifty  years  of  total  abstinence 
from  that  which  their  founder  had  designed  to 
be  the  glory  of  his  race  and  age !  We  may  en- 
tertain feelings  of  the  darkest  hatred  towards 
the  special  white  elephant  whose  requirements 
are  sapping  the  foundation  of  our  fortunes ;  but 
we  experience  sensations  of  tender  pity  for,  and 
sympathy  with,  the  one  who  is  left  quite  alone 
by  his  prudent  owners.  Rollescourt  would  have 
ruined  any  resident  under  a  royal  personage — 
this  was  patent ;  nevertheless,  it  was  pitiable  to 
see  such  banquet  halls  deserted. 


Every  old  house  has  its  story.  Rollescourt 
had  a  terribly  sad  one,  and  it  was  illustrated 
too.  They  came  upon  it — this  party  of  young 
people  whose  fortunes  we  are  following — sud- 
denly ;  that  is  to  say,  they  stepped  out  of  the 
sombre  chapel  into  a  room  that  was  small  by 
comparison,  and  that  had  an  air  of  being  used, 
and  not  merely  looked  at,  that  struck  home  to 
their  hearts  at  once. 

On  the  walls  of  this  room  there  hung  four 
portraits.  The  first  was  of  a  gentleman  of  the 
period  of  billowing  coat  lappels  and  multiplicity 
of  waistcoats.  To  judge  from  his  appearance, 
as  here  represented,  no  one  would  have  sup- 
posed that  romance  and  himself  could  ever  so 
remotely  have  come  in  contact  with  one  an- 
other ;  yet  he  was  the  hero  of  the  story,  such 
as  it  was.' 

By  his  side — in  a  more  prominent  position,  in 
a  richer  frame,  and  in  a  better  light — hung  the 
full-length  figure  of  a  woman — a  tall,  stately 
woman,  whose  velvet  robe  draped  her  form  in 
most  statuesque  folds,  and  whose  dark  eyes 
gleamed  out  at  you  with  a  passionate  vehemence 
that  contrasted  strangely  with  the  firm,  thin 
lips.  A  matron  lady,  obviously — for  hers  was 
a  fully  matured  beauty,  all  perfect  as  it  was.  A 
matron  lady — the  mother  of  the  boy  who  oc- 
cupied the  foreground  to  the  left  of  the  same 
picture,  on  whose  head  (the  fac- simile  of  her 
own  in  bearing,  form,  and  expression)  one  of 
her  slender  white  hands  rested  lightly. 

Opposite  to  these  portraits  hung  a  third — that 
of  a  young  girl,  who  lived  by  the  painter's  art 
— the  sweetest,  fairest  thing  in  all  this  grand 
old  place.  It  was  a  bright,  almost  breathing 
beauty  that  dwelt  on  her  parted  full  lips — in 
her  laughing,  unclouded  eyes — on  her  sunny 
brow — on  every  feature,  every  portion  of  the 
vigorous  young  form  "that  seemed  to  be  leaning 
forward  to  look  at  you.  She  might  have  passed 
for  a  representation  of  the  spirit  of  Joy.  That 
delineation  of  careless,  griefless,  guileless,  per- 
fect womanhood,  brought  you  up,  and  compelled 
you  to  gaze  at  it  as  unfailingly,  as  admiringly, 
as  lovingly,  as  did  that  portrait  of  the  Austrian 
Empress  which  we  all  knew  so  well  in  the  gal- 
lery of  the  Exhibition  of  1862. 

This  bright  creature,  who  seemed  to  breathe  ; 
this  embodiment  of  the  spirit  of  Joy ;  this  girl, 
whose  cloudless  brow  bore  no  trace  of  even  so 
much  as  a  coming  grief  or  care,  was  the  heroine 
of  the  story,  and  the  daughter  of  the  stately 
lady  in  the  velvet  robe. 

They  knew  the  story  already,  but  the  illustra- 
tions were  new  to  them ;  so  they  stood  looking 
at  them  long  and  earnestly,  with  a  certain  sym- 
pathy in  their  breasts  for  the  one  who  had  erred 
most,  and,  unquestionably,  not  suffered  least. 
Why  they  did  so  shall  now  be  told. 

The  man  was  not  a  son  of  the  house  with 
whose  traditions  he  was  inseparably  linked. 
He  had  come  to  Rollescourt  in  his  earliest  man- 
hood, a  stranger,  to  be  tutor  to  the  young  lord 
of  the  house — to  the  boy  on  whose  head  the 
hand  of  the  stately  lady  rested — to  the  only 
son  of  that  lady  who  was  the  widow  of  the  last 
lord  of  Rollescourt. 

This  man — his  name  was  Ralph  Crauford — • 
had  come  there  a  stranger,  but  he  had  brought 
with  him  credentials  that  satisfied  even  th,a 
overweening  care  and  pride  of  the  lady,  all  ofinj 


ON  GUARD. 


45 


whose  love  and  interest  at  this  time  were  vested 
in  her  boy.  So  it  came  to  pass  that  his  services 
were  accepted,  and  that  he  settled  there  as  one 
of  themselves. 

In  time  the  boy's  sister  shared  his  studies, 
and  the  tutor,  who  was  young  and  handsome, 
then  began  to  realise  that  he  was  not  a  mere 
machine  for  imparting  instruction.  She  was 
so  brightly,  warmly  beautiful  that  she  lit  up 
the -dark,  old  library  like  a  sunbeam,  and  after 
awhile  the  man  forgot  he  was  only  an  upper 
servant,  and  got  dazzled  by  her  rays. 

"Then  she  forgot  it,  tool  Forgot  the  claims 
she  had  as  daughter  of  so  proud  a  house ;  for- 
got how  coldly  her  mother  looked  upon  all  that 
was  not  scholarly  in  this  man — how  systemati- 
cally she  sank  him  as  a  man,  as  it  were,  and 
recognised  him  alone  in  his  official  capacity ; 
forgot  that  it  would  be  hopeless,  utterly,  utterly 
hopeless,  to  do  so,  and  like  the  true  woman  that 
she  was,  loved  in  the  wrong  direction. 

About  the  same  time  that  her  fair  young 
daughter  let  the  man  see  that  she  had  forgotten 
so  much  that  was  wise  and  well,  the  mother 
grew  discreet.  The  stately  lady — the  proud 
matron,  now  in  her  best  bloom  of  woman- 
hood—swooped down  upon  them  daily,  and 
superintended  their  studies  and  many  other 
things,  and  the  sunbeam  paled  a  little  for 
awhile,  and  the  tutor  regained  a  portion  of  his 
memory. 

By-and-by,  the  sunbeam  faded  still  more,  and 
this  time  it  was  with  a  terrible  fear.  Her 
brother's  tutor  began  to  be  wise  for  her — wise 
in  the  way  that  it  was  an  agony  for  her  to 
watch.  He  ceased  to  woo  her  with  the  words  and 
eyes  and  sighs  of  a  love  that  had  become  a  por- 
tion of  her  life,  and  at  the  same  time  her  mother 
ceased  to  ice  him  by  her  bearing. 

The  lady  and  her  daughter  were,  rivals  in 
fact;  rivals  in  the  heart  of  a  man  who  "loved 
whate'er  he  looked  on"  in  the  shape  of  a  beau- 
tiful woman,  and  who  was  determined  to  secure 
one  of  those  women  who  loved  him,  at  all  haz- 
ards— at  any  cost  to  himself  and  her,  and  the 
other  who  should  be  left. 

So  he  bribed  the  girl  with  gentle  words  and 
tender  caresses,  and  vows  of  passionate  devo- 
tion, to  go  away  for  a  time,  and  leave  all  to  his 
management.  Then  she,  sorely  fearing  what 
might  come  of  it,  but  hoping,  trusting,  believ- 
ing still,  went  away,  with  a  sort  of  vague  im- 
pression (that  both  lover  and  mother  had  fos- 
tered) on  her  mind,  that  her  mother  was  but 
seeming  to  frown  upon  her  love  till  she  might 
give  way  with  grace. 

She  waited  and  waited  till  she  wearied  of 
waiting.  She  was  patient  till  patience  would 
have  been  mere  torpor  if  longer  indulged  in. 
She  stayed  away,  till  each  thought  of  what 
might  be  happening  the  while  struck  like  a 
poisoned  dart  into  her  brain,  and  till  the  worst 
of  all  malarias — a  feverish  jealousy  of  no  one 
in  particular — enfeebled  her  mind.  Then  she 
went  home  and  found  her  lover  married  to  her 
mother. 

She  came  home  at  night,  and  they  could  not 
stay  her  on  her  way  to  the  room  where  the 
bridal  pair  sat  hearing  themselves  wished  long 
life  and  happiness  by  applauding  friends.  Her 
brother,  roaming  gloomily  away  from  the  festive 
scene,  had  met  and  told  her  the  cause  of  it,  so 


she  understood  it  all  when  she  entered,  and 
they  turned  to  her  amazed. 

It  has  been  said  that  the  worst  of  all  mala- 
rias— jealousy — was  at  work  in  her  system? 
All  her  joyousness,  all  her  softness,  all  her  love 
died  out  in  the  instant  she  beheld  them — her 
tender  lover  and  her  tender  mother— together; 
and  she  dealt  her  blow  at  him  with  the  first 
thing  she  laid  her  hand  upon,  which  happened 
to  be  a  carving  knife. 

The  man  died— and  went,  let  us  hope,  to  the 
best  heaven  a  poltroon  may  know.  The  girl 
lived — mad  and  immured— till  her  hair  was 
grey,  and  the  memory  of  her  wrongs  and  crime 
faint  in  the  land.  The  mother  lived  sane,  which 
was  the  hardest  fate  of  all,  I  think. 

That  is  the  story  of  the  four  portraits  which 
hang  in  the  cosiest  little  room  in  Rollescourt. 


CHAPTER  XT. 

BELLA   AT   HOME. 

THE  interest  of  the  place  culminated  in  this 
room.  It  had  been  judiciously  ordained  that 
sight-seeing  should  end  here,  and  the  visitor 
should  be  let  dcPvvn  from  the  heights  to  which 
his  "imagination  had  soared,  by  a  flight  of  back- 
stairs. 

So  they  went  away  fresh  from  it,  and  conse- 
quently full  of  it ;  but  somehow  or  other  it  was 
the  tenderest  of  the  party,  it  was  Florence 
alone,  who  could  speak  glibly  on  the  subject. 

"  Poor  little  thing !  she  looks  so  very  fair  and 
bright  after  all  these  years.  I  can't  help  think- 
ing of  her,  and  loving  her  as  if  she  had  lived 
still.  Wasn't  it  a  cruel  fate,  Claude  ?  " 

They  were  descending  a  narrow  stone  stair- 
case as  Florence  spoke — one  of  those  winding, 
never-ending,  brain-bewildering  staircases  that 
we  do  find  in  the  back-regions  of  old  man- 
sions. Major  "Walsingham  was  just  a  step  in 
advance  of  Florence,  and-  h.e  had  taken  her 
hand  and  placed  it  on  his  own  shoulder,  for  the 
purpose  of  ensuring  her  safety  in  the  descent. 
Bella  had  marked  the  action,  the  kind  brotherly 
action,  which  showed  regard  for  Florry's  safety, 
nothing  more,  and  Miss  Yane  felt  nettled,  for 
she  thought  she  saw  more  in  it. 

"  Pray,  Florry,  keep  your  love  and  pity  for 
some  more  deserving  object ;  those  '  love  and 
revenge '  people  are  odious  to  me :  she  was  lit- 
tle better  than  a  wild  beast." 

Bella  spoke  very  warmly,  and  her  whole  face 
was  suffused  with  colour.  The  cause  seemed 
insufficient  for  the  effects,  considering  how  long 
past  those  events  of  which  they  spoke  were. 

"  She  was  sharply  tried,  you  must  remember, 
Bella,"  Stanley  Villars  replied;  "the  faith  that 
was  so  basely  broken  was  feigned  to  the  last, 
remember." 

"  Poor  Crauford !  he  paid  a  terrible  penalty 
for  trying  to  please  her  while  he  could,"  Bella 
said,  with  a  hard  little  laugh.  "  You  none  of 
you  seem  to  think  it  possible  that  he  may  have 
loved  the  mother  better  than  the  girl," 

"  He  had  given  his  love  voluntarily  to  the 
girl." 

"And  he  changed  his  mind.  How  could  he 
help  it — he  was  but  human  ? "  she  replied, 


•16 


ON  GUARD. 


quickly.  "How  unsympathetic  you  all  are 
with  the  one  who  erred  most  humanely,  after 
all.  Florry  bestows  love  and  pity  upon  the  one 
who  gave  way  to  the  lowest,  most  brutal  feel- 
ings of  revenge.  But  you  have  not  a  grain  of 
sympathy  for  the  one  who  gave  way  to  the  feel- 
ings of  his  heart  when  he  found  that  he  had 
been  mistaken  about  his  first  love." 

"  People  are  not  justified  in  making  such 
mistakes,1'  Stanley  Villars  said,  quietly.  He 
had  waited  for  Claude  to  answer  Bella's  last 
tirade,  but  Claude  had  walked  along,  his  hands 
in  his  pockets,  and  his  eyes  bent  on  the  ground, 
without  speaking. 

"  Not  justified !  No,  I  don't  say  they  are 
justified,  but  it's  natural;  some  people  can't 
help  it,  and  because  it's  '  their  nature  to,'  they 
are  to  be  murdered,  and  told  it  serves  them 
right ! " 

"Worse  than  that  befalls  them  sometimes," 
Stanley  said,  in  a  low  voice. 

"  What  ?  what  can  be  worse  ?  " 

"  The  knowledge  may  force  itself  upon  them 
that  they  have  murdered  another  morally. 
Bella,  why  are  you  defending  recreants  from  a 
freely-pledged  faith  ?  " 

"  Only  because  I  hate  injustice,"  she  answer- 
ed. "  I  like  toleration  in  all  things.  One  is 
not  deemed  worse  than  the  beasts  that  perish 
if  one  finds  a  friendship  a  bore  when  once  one 
thought  it  a  blessing ;  but  there  seems  to  be  no 
heaven  and  no  hope  in  the  minds  of  the  majo- 
rity for  the  man  who  breaks  an  engagement 
because  he  finds  he  can't  fulfil  it  honorably 
with  his  whole  heart." 

"Is  it  to  men  alone  you  are  so  lenient? 
Would  you  not  extend  such  liberty  of  action  to 
women  also,  Bella  ?  " 

"  The  case  in  point  was  a  man's ;  besides, 
Stanley,  men  are  more  generous  than  women  " 
— she  went  nearer  to  him  as  she  said  this,  and 
placed  her  hand  within  his  arm — "they  release 
and  forgive." 

An  almost. perceptible  shudder  ran  through 
his  frame.  He  loved  her  so  dearly,  and  she 
seemed  to  be  lapsing  from  him,  and  appealing 
to  his  manliness  not  to  hold  her  back.  How 
had  this  evil  come  to  pass  ?  How  had  Claude 
— for  he  could  not  doubt  that  it  was  Claude — 
gained  this  influence  over  her  without  an  effort 
that  had  been  apparent  to  him,  Stanley.  He 
had  seen  every  look,  had  watched  every  word 
that  had  passed  between  his  friend  and  his  love 
since  they  had  been  together  at  Denham,  and 
there  had  been  nothing  with  which  he  could 
charge  either.  Yet  the  thing  seemed  to  be 
growing,  and  he  could  not  check  its  growth. 
"  He  was  but  human,"  as  Bella  had  said  about 
Ralph  Crauford,  and  he  was  very  miserable. 

He  resolved  to  speak  to  her — to  ask  her  what 
this  change  that  had  come  over  her,  which  he 
felt  and  could  not  analyse,  meant.  Walking 
there  by  her  side,  while  it  was  still  impossible 
that  he  should  do  so,  he  determined  on  having 
an  explanation  with  her,  and  of  being  magnani- 
mous even  as  she  would  wish  him  to  be,  if  his 
fears  —  his  heart-subduing  fears  —  were  well 
founded.  Thus  he  felt  for  a  minute  or  two. 
Then  he  looked  at  her  again,  and  saw  her  so 
fair,  and  knew  her  all  his  own  as  yet,  and 
acknowledged  that  he  could  not  tear  her  from 
himself  without  dying  in  the  struggle. 


They  had  loitered  away  many  hours  in  that 
old  house,  which  gave  them  another  example 
of  the  old  story  of  being  loved,  and  left,  and 
lost.  It  was  evening  before  the  "  Park  Inn  " 
was  regained,  and  the  horses  put  in,  and  the 
start  homewards  made  ;  and  evening  seemed  to 
justify  silence  on  the  part  of  all,  and  smoking 
on  the  part  of  the  men. 

Claude  was  simply  taciturn.  Fascinated  as 
he  knew  himself  to  his  cost  to  be,  by  Miss  Vane, 
he  had  felt  her  special  pleading  on  behalf  of 
faithlessness  in  general  to  be  ill-timed,  weak, 
and  unnecessarily  aggravating  to  Stanley.  It 
had  come  to  this  that  he  saw  it  to  be  on  the 
cards  that  Stanley  might  suffer  largely  through 
Bella  and  himself.  But  the  loyalty,  that  was 
not  dead  yet,  towards  his  friends,  made  him 
averse  to  small  foreshadowings  of  that  suffering 
being  thrown  over  Stanley  by  Bella's  hand 
when  there  was  no  immediate  call  for  them. 
Being  annoyed,  and  being  "  but  human,"  he 
relapsed  into  taciturnity  for  the  greater  portion 
of  the  drive  home.  Even  then,  when  he  had 
no  more  cigars  to  smoke,  and  there  existed, 
therefore,  no  longer  any  just  cause  and  impedi- 
ment why  he  should  not  speak,  he  chiefly 
addressed  Florry. 

This  course  of  conduct  of  Major  Walsing- 
ham's,  which  caused  poor,  weak,  erring  Bella 
much  anguish,  was  dictated  partly  by  prudence, 
partly  by  right  feeling,  and  partly  by  a  sore 
sensation  that  was  something  akin  to  jealousy. 
Prudential  motives  taught  him  that  to  throw  off 
all  disguise  and  devote  nimself  to  her,  as  he  had 
it  in  his  heart  to  devote  himself,  would  be  rash  in 
the  extreme  in  the  case  of  a  young  lady  so  given 
lo  acting  on  impulse  as  was  Miss  Vane.  Good 
feeling  told  him  that  Florry  who  had  loved  him 
so  long,  and  shown,  in  her  sweet,  unsuspicious 
way,  that  she  had  done  so — shown  it  freely, 
shown  it  purely — deserved  something  better  at 
his  hands  than  neglect.  But  more  powerful 
than  either  of  these  motives  for  chilling  Bella 
was  the  bastard  jealousy  that  would  obtain  in 
his  soul,  of  the  authorised  intimacy  that  existed 
still  between  the  woman  he  loved  and  another 
man.  It  was  not  a  noble,  exalted,  legitimate 
passion — jealousy  very  rarely  is — but  it  was  as 
strong  as  death,  and  cruel  as  the  grave.  He 
could  not  check  it.  Worse  than  this,  he  could 
not  check  the  sights,  the  sounds,  the  thousand 
small  causes  which  brought  it  into  being.  It 
was  only  right,  and  fair,  and  proper  that  Stan- 
ley should  touch  Bella's  hand  with  a  touch  that 
told  the  man  who  was  watching  how  dear  a 
thing  that  hand  was.  "  God  of  heaven  !  perhaps 
he  kisses  her  when  I  am  not  by !"  he  thought; 
and  as  this  not  remarkably  improbable  contin- 
gency struck  him,  he  would  grind  his  teeth  to- 
gether, and  but  just  refrain  from  stamping  his 
foot  with  the  cruel  rage  it  cost  him.  So,  as 
these  feelings  obtained  more  and  more  dominion 
over  him,  as  he  grew  to  love  her  deeper  and 
deeper  still,  he  could  not  resist  the  temptation 
to  punish  her  a  little,  and  make  her  miserable 
in  a  measure,  since  he  was  so  himself. 

Poor  Bella  writhed  under  the  torture  as  soon 
as  it  was  applied.  Those  words  of  Stanley's 
that  report  had  said — "  Claude  was  sweet  on 
Florry" — were  ever  ringing  in  her  ears;  so  at 
once,  as  soon  as  Claude  looked  at  or  spoke  to 
Florry,  Bella  fancied  that  he  was  corroborating 


ON  GUARD. 


report.  She  ached  at  the  idea,  and  nearly  fell 
off  the  back  of  the  trap  with  emotion,  and  hated 
Florry  for  her  blooming  unruffled  beauty,  and 
the  happy  freedom  with  which  she  was  con- 
versing with  their  charioteer. 

Matters  went  on  in  this  way  for  many  days — 
days  that  seemed  like  weeks  for  three  of  them, 
they  were  so  fraught  with  feeling  and  remorse, 
but-  that  were  but  as  hours,  and  those  fairy- 
footed,  to  Florry,  who  took  the  top  of  things 
alone,  and  if  the  top  chanced  to  be  fine,  never 
bewailed  the  possibly  inferior  quality  of  what 
was  away  at  the  bottom.  She  was  very  happy 
in  Claude's  presence,  and  in  the  receipt  of 
Claude's  somewhat  fitful  attentions.  It  never 
occurred  to  her  to  distrust  them,  or  to  dread  a 
canker  at  the  root  of  her  brother's  engage- 
ment. 

Stanley  had  put  off  speaking  to  Bella  indefi- 
nitely. He  was  far  more  chary  of  his  reprehen- 
sions now,  than  he  had  been  during  the  first 
days  of  his  engagement..  He  was  bitterly  con- 
scious, in  fact,  that  if  he  strained  this  chord 
whicl^  was  more  than  life  to  him,  she  would 
snap  it  and  cast  him  adrift;  and  he  clung  to 
the  hope  of  this  being  a  mere  fever  for  Claude, 
an  illness  of  the  soul  that  would  pass  away  and 
leave  her  as  she  had  been  before.  He  had 
ceased  from  the  folly  now  of  pressing  Major 
Walsirigham  to  stay  on,  and  he  knew  that  he 
had  erred  in  having  ever  done  so.  But  still 
Major  Walsingham  did  stay  on,  and  the  fever 
palpably  continued,  and  there  was  no  valid  ex- 
cuse for  removing  the  cause  of  it. 

August  came  at  last,  and  with  it  an  eager 
desire  on  the  part  of  Miss  Yane  to  go  up  to 
town  to  her  mamma.  "  My  mother  wishes  you 
to  be  her  guest,  Bella,"  Stanley  said.  "  I  should 
like  you  to  go  to  her." 

_"  But  mamma  wouldn't  like  it,"  Bella  said, 
seized  with  a  dutiful  fit  on  the  instant;  "I 
couldn't  think  of  leaving  mamma  for  any  one, 
for  the  little  time  I  shall  be  a  free  agent" 
(there  was  still  a  talk  of  their  being  married  in 
September). 

Mr.  Villars  felt  chagrined.  He  had  grave 
doubts  of  the  life  Bella  would  lead  under  her 
mother's,  roof  being  the  life  he  would  desire  his 
bride-elect  to  lead.  With  his  mother  and  two 
sisters,  Bella  would  have  been  better  placed, 
according  to  his  notions— left  less  to  herself! 
He  had  hoped  that  Florence's  companionship 
would  have  become  sufficiently  dear  to  Bella, 
during  this  time  they  had  spent  together  at 
Denham,  to  make  Miss  Vane  covet  a  continu- 
ance of  it.  Miss  Vane,  however,  so  far  from 
coveting  a  continuance  of  it,  never  uttered  a 
word  which  could  be  construed  into  the  mildest 
desire  for  such  a  thing.  There  was  no  help  for 
it.  She  was  resolved  to  go  to  her  "  own  mother 
for  three  weeks,"  and  on  the  surface  the  resolve 
was  all  that  was  correct. 

Soon  Mrs.  Vane  reported  herself  established 
in  her  temporary  town  residence,  and  the  Den- 
ham  party  broke  up.  The  two  girls  went  up  to 
London,  escorted  by  Stanley,  and  Major  Wal- 
singham started  for  the  west  of  England,  to 
spend  a  short  time  with  his  own  family. 

One  of  Sir  Gerald  Villars'  carriages'  was  at 
the  station  to  meet  his  sister,  with  a  note,  giving 
them  the  information  that  there  was  an  hour- 
old  heir  to  the  title  again.  «  You  had  better 


go  and  see  Lady  Villars,  Florry,"  her  younger 
brother  remarked.  "  Give  my  love  to  them, 
and  tell  them  I'm  delighted.  I  shall  see  Bella 
safely  home." 

Bella  got  into  her  mother's  brougham  after 
embracing  Florence,  and  saying  that  she  "  hoped 
they  would  meet  again  in  a  day  or  two,"  and 
Stanley  followed  her,  heartily  glad  to  have  her 
to  himself  again,  and  blindly  deeming  that  all 
danger  was  over,  since  Claude  had  certainly  had 
no  plans  of  returning  to  town  almost  immediate- 
ly when  they  parted.  Stanley  was  only  going 
to  stay  one  night  in  London,  and  return  to  his 
duties  on  the  following  morning.  He  had, 
therefore,  not  too  much  time  in  which  to  say  the 
many  things  he  had  to  say  to  her;  but  he  found 
that  he  was  not  to  say  them  yet. 

"  My  head  aches  from  the  train,"  Bella  said 
softly,  as  soon  as  they  drove  off;  "please  don't 
speak  to  me  till  we  get  home,  Stanley,  or  I  shall 
be  worse." 

Condemned  to  silence,  the  way  seemed  very 
long  to  Mr.  Villars ;  but  he  would  not  disobey 
her,  for  she  was  leaning  back  in  the  corner, 
looking  very  pale  and  weary,  with  her  eyes 
closed,  and  one  of  her  hands  pressed  against  her 
forehead.  The  attitude  betokened  pain  unmis- 
takeably  —  wearing  pain,  either  mental  or 
bodily.  Pie  fondly  hoped  that  it  might  only  be 
the  latter. 

He  beguiled  the  time  by  conjuring  up  a  vision 
of  a  Mrs.  Vane,  for  he  had  never  seen  Bella's 
mother  yet.  By  the  time  he  had  arranged  and 
draped  four  or  five  utterly  different  figures,  the 
carriage  stopped  at  the  door  of  a  house,  with 
an  awning  stretched  over  a  flower-laden  bal- 
cony, and  another  over  the  steps,  on  which 
scarlet  cloth  was  spread,  and  Bella  Vane  was 
at  home. 

"  This  must  be  wrong,  Bella,"  he  said,  check - 
ng  her  on  the  step  ;  "  there  are  preparations  for 
a  party — it's  the  next  house." 

"  No,  this  is  right,  Stanley.  I  forgot  to  tell 
you  mamma  has  a  few  friends  to-night,"  she 
said,  hurriedly  running  up,  and  through  the 
quickly  opened  door.  "  Come  up  at  once,  and 
let  me  introduce  you  to  mamma  before  people 
come." 

He  followed  her  slowly,  feeling  annoyed  and 
tricked  in  a  small,  low  way.  It  was  nothing  to 
him,  of  course,  whether  Mrs.  Vane  saw  "  a  few 
friends"  every  night— or  every  moment,  for  that 
matter — of  her  life.  But  it  was  much  to  him 
that  Bella  should  make  little  concealments  from 
him ;  it  forced  the  unwilling  conviction  upon 
him  that  she  was  well  inclined  that  way. 

They  found  Mrs.  Vane  sitting  in  the  drawing- 
room.  She  was  very  tall,  very  fair,  very  faded, 
very  unlike  her  daughter  in  all  respects ;  but 
there  was  something  <narvellously  pleasing  in 
her  perfectly  effortless  manner.  It  was  repose 
that  sprang  from  the  most  thorough  laziness — 
naturalism  that  was  too  indolent  to  be  anything 
else.  But  it  was  pleasant  to  behold,  and  put 
you  at  your  ease  at  once,  it  was  so  very  perfect 
in  its  way.  As  soon  as  he  saw  Mrs.  Vane, 
Stanley  Villars  understood  how  it  came  about 
that  Bella  was  what  she  was. 

The  tall,  fair,  lymphatic  woman  rose  up  as 
they  approached  her,  and  kissed  her  daughter. 
Then  she  gave  her  hand  to  Stanley,  and  said, 
"You're  to  be  my  son-in-law,  I  find.  I  am 


48 


ON  GUARD. 


very  happy  to  see  you."  "With  that  she  sat 
down  again  ;  and  while  Bella  made  a  rapid  tour 
of  the  room,  and  buried  her  face  in  quick  suc- 
cession in  several  vases  of  flowers,  inhaling  their 
sweetness  with  a  rapture  that  was  partly  real 
and  partly  put  on  to  hide  a  trifling  emotion  she 
could  not  entirely  subdue,  Mrs.  Vane  looked  at 
her  hands,  and  smiled  gently  into  space. 

They  were  long,  slender,  white  hands,  that 
never  writhed  or  contorted  themselves.  The 
most  violent  exercise  they  ever  took,  was  when 
they  inserted  each  other  into  gloves.  Generally 
they  sat  upon  her  lap,  resting  one  upon  the 
other,  with  the  taper  lingers  bent  ever  so  slight- 
ly. Thus  they  would  remain  for  hours  with 
rarely  a  change  in  their  position — never  a 
change  in  their  hue. 

It  needed  but  to  see  one  of  these  hands  of 
hers,  and,  without  a  glance  at  the  remainder  of 
the  woman,  all  the  weakness  of  her  character 
might  be  read  by  those  who  ran. 

"You  won't  dress  till  after  dinner,  please," 
Mrs.  Vane  said,  looking  from  one  to  the  other, 
appealingly,  when  Bella  came  back,  after  her 
inspection  of  the  floral  adornments. 

"A  great  bore  to  dine  in  a  travelling  dress; 
one  feels  so  dusty,"  Bella  replied.  "  "When  was 
dinner  to  be  ready,  mamma?" 

"  Ten  minutes  after  you  came  in,"  Mrs.  Vane 
said,  settling  further  back  into  her  chair. 
"  Have  it  your  own  way,  dear — only  order  it 
yourself." 

"  Dine  in  your  travelling  dress  for  once,  Bella, 
ns  your  mother  wishes  it,"  Stanley  whispered ; 
•'you  will  be  obliged  to  make  a  wonderful  toilet 
by-and-by,  I  suppose :  but  this  dress  will  do  to 
dine  in." 

In  the  Villars  family  the  mother's  will  was 
law  to  her  children — a  law  they  loved  to  live 
under,  and  that  they  never  thought  of  question- 
ing. It  pained  him  to  see  Bella  put  Mrs.  Vane 
aside,  weak  as  Mrs.  Vane  was. 

"Do  to  dine  in!  It's  not  that;  but  I  want 
to  rest  and  refresh  myself  after  that  awful  jour- 
ney." Then  she  rang  and  ordered  the  dinner 
back  half  an  hour,  unceremoniously ;  and  Mrs. 
Vane  smiled  perfect  satisfaction  at  the  altera- 
tion in  her  plans. 

Stanley  was  dressed  and  down  in  the  draw- 
ing-room again  for  some  short  time  before  the 
arbitrary  queen  of  his  soul.  When  she  saw 
him  come  in  by  himself,  Mrs.  Vane  appeared  to 
feel  that  he  devolved  upon  her,  and  forthwith 
she  made  conversational  efforts. 

"  I  am  afraid  the  dinner  will  be  spoilt,  Mr. 
Villars ;  but  it  is  of  no  consequence,  as  Bella 
wished  it." 

"  On  the  contrary,"  he  said,  "  Bella  had  no 
business  to  spoil  your  dinner ;  you  must  scold 
her  if  she  has  done  so.'*»' 

He  saw  that,  even  in  joke,  the  idea  of  scold- 
ing Bella  was  a  foreign  one  to  Mr.  Vane. 

"Scold  her!"  she  repeated;  "  really  I  shall 
not  care  about  the  dinner;  and  even  if  I  did — " 
She  paused  for  a  moment,  and  then  added, 
"  Bella  has  so  much  energy ;  it  is  a  great  bless- 
ing that  she  has,  for  my  health  would  never 
permit  me  to  exert  myself,  so  she  has  always 
pleased  herself  without  troubling  me,  and  I  am 
sure  no  daughter  could  be  a  greater  comfort  to 
a  mother.1" 

Mrs.  Vane  was  terribly  afraid  that  Mr.  Villars 


would  be  expecting  her  to  control  or  direct 
Bella  in  some  way  or  other.  It  was  quite  worth 
while  verbally  exerting  herself  to  avoid  such 
fearful  labour  as  this.  "  No  daughter  could  be 
a  greater  comfort  to  a  mother  than  she  has  al- 
ways been  to  me,"  she  repeated  emphatically  ; 
and  then  she  tried  to  bribe  him  to  let  her  suffer 
Bella  to  continue  unmolested  by  maternal  in- 
fluence, by  saying — 

"  I  assure  you,  I  don't  think  I  could  bring 
myself  to  resign  her  to  any  one  but  you." 

Broadly  speaking,  this  was  sacrificing  truth 
to  politeness.  Mrs.  Vane  would  have  brought 
herself  to  resigning  Bella  to  any  mortal  man  to 
whom  Bella  gave  orders  that  she  should  be  re- 
signed. She  knew  very  well  that  she  would 
have  done  so ;  and,  in  a  lazy  kind  of  way,  it 
occurred  to  her  that  most  probably  Mr.  Villars 
knew  it  too.  But  she  hoped  that  her  little 
lapse  from  perfect  veracity  would  sound  pleas- 
antly in  his  ears,  and  induce  him  to  cease  from 
troubling  her  about  Bella's  manners  and  cus- 
toms, till  Bella  came  down  and  could  undertake 
the  defence  of  them  herself. 

In  due  time  Bella  came  down,  and  they 
dined ;  and  Mrs.  Vane  awoke  to  an  immediate 
sense  of  expecting  people.  "Bella  has  ex 
plained  to  you  why  we  have  friends  to-night, 
Mr.  Villars?"  Mrs.  Vane  said  to  him  about 
nine  o'clock;  and  when  he  somewhat  sulkily 
replied,  "No,  Bella  had  not,"  Mrs.  Vane  re- 
sponded, "  Oh  !"  in  as  thoroughly  satisfied  a 
tone  as  if  her  first  suggestion  had  been  founded 
on  fact,  o,r.  which  was  more  probable,  as  if  it 
were  not  of  the  smallest  consequence  whether 
or  not  Bella  had  so  explained. 

To  tell  the  truth,  Stanley  was  feeling  some- 
what injured  and  neglected.  Bella  was  taken 
up  with  a  variety  of  matters  with  which  she 
need  not  have  been  taken  up  during  the  few 
short  hours  he  would  still  be  with  her.  She 
was  all  the  "  daughter  of  the  house,"  truly,  but 
it  was  in  an  anticipatory  sort  of  way  that  was 
not  particularly  flattering  to  him,  the  present 
guest.  "  I  have  something  to  say  to  you,  Bella ; 
come  in  here  for  five  minutes,"  he  had  said  to 
her,  when  they  were  journeying  back  to  the 
drawing-room  after  dinner.  He  would  not  stay 
below  and  take  wine  drearily  by  himself;  he 
wanted  Bella  to  go  with  him  for  five  minutes 
into  a  little  room,  through  the  open  door  of 
which  he  caught  a  glimpse  of  gleaming  white 
statuettes  backed  against  crimson  velvet,  and 
coloured  wax  candles  cleverly  interspersed 
amidst  flowers  in  full  bloom.  He  wranted  her 
to  go  in  there  and  hear  the  something  he  un- 
guardedly confessed  to  her  that  he  had  to  say, 
and  Bella  would  not. 

"  I  will  attend  to  whatever  you  have  to  say 
directly,  Stanley ;  but  I  must  see  to  the  guitar 
first.  Mamma  will  expect  me  to  sing,  and  of 
course  a)l  the  strings  will  fly  as  soon  as  I  touch 
them.  I'll  get  that  over  first." 

He  did  not  relish  this  promise  of  attention 
being  paid  to  him  after  the  guitar's  claims  had 
been  settled.  But  Bella,,  ensconced  in  her  home 
duties,  was  unassailable.  There  was  nothing 
for  him  to  do  but  to  wait  her  good  pleasure. 

Her  good  pleasure  led  her  to  make  a  very 
long  and  arduous  business  cf  that  re-stringing\ ; 
the  guitar,  a  business  that  it  was  irritating  toj. 
him  to  watch.     At  the  best  of  times,  and  under 


ON  GUARD. 


49 


the  happiest  auspices,  a  guitar  and  himself  were 
far  from  sympathetic.  But  now  he  was  out  of 
tune,  and  the  guitar  was  the  same;  and  he 
hated  it,  as  an  excuse,  that  was  not  even  me- 
lodious, for  lounging  attitudes  and  languishing 
looks.  Bella  was  employing  herself  with  ap- 
parently laborious  exactness  about  it  now ;  but 
he  felt  that,  when  the  few  friends  came,  he 
should  have  cause  to  detest  it  and  its  blue  rib- 
bon. 

Some  of  the  friends  came  at  ten,  some  shortly 
after.  By  eleven,  at  all  events,  Stanley  knew 
the  worst :  all  who  were  to  arrive  had  arrived. 
Mrs.  Yane  was  not  that  awful  product  of  nature, 
a  feminine  seeker  of  celebrities.  The  class  of 
women  of  whom  Mrs.  Leo  Hunter  may  stand  as 
the  type  are  not  indolent,  let  them  be  faulty  in 
other  respects  as  they  will.  Mrs.  Yane  was  not 
one  to  assiduously  look  up  the  last  living  thing 
in  literature,  art,  or  the  drama,  and  forthwith 
lure  it  into  her  web.  But  she  was  something 
almost  equally  distressing— a  woman  who  took 
what  came  first,  when  it  behoved  her  to  take 
anything  at  all ;  and  regarded  all  men  (of  her 
own  class)  as  equal  in  mind,  body,  and  social 
qualifications.  Inertly  amiable,  and  thoroughly 
well-disposed,  she  sat  and  smiled  upon  the  peo- 
ple who  came  to  stand  about  in  the  draught  in 
her  rooms,  and  eat  wafer  biscuits  and  ices ;  and 
never  troubled  herself  to  think  whether  they 
were  amused  or  amusing.  She  invited  them 
because,  in  the  second  year  of  her  widowhood, 
the  weaker-minded  of  Bella's  two  guardians 
had  said  to  her,  "My  dear  madam,  you  must 
keep  up  with  the  world.  You  must  see  people. 
Above  all,  you  must  see  poor  Yane's  set,  for  your 
little  girl's  sake."  She  obeyed,  because  she 
saw  no  more  reason  for  not  seeing  people  than 
for  seeing  them.  What  good  the  vision  was  to 
do  either  herself  or  her  child,  or  anybody  else, 
she  did  not  distress  herself  by  attempting  to 
discover.  "  Poor  Yane's  set"  had  been  an  elas- 
tic, not  to  say  a  limitless  one.  His  widow  was 
far  from  being  sure  where  it  began,  or  where  it 
ended.  This  was  of  small  consequence.  There 
were  plenty  of  people  in  the  world,  and  she  had 
no  prejudices. 

This  being  the  case,  it  will  readily  be  under- 
stood that  her  gatherings  were  variable  in  their 
nature.  When  Bella  took  the  management  of 
them  into  her  own  resolute  young  hands,  salient 
points,  in  the  shape  of  the  best  she  knew,  were 
put  in,  and  their  complementary  colours  provid- 
ed for  them.  But  when  Mrs.  Yane  (as  now) 
drifted  into  an  evening  party  without  her  daugh- 
ter's protection,  the  dull  drab  of  inane  mediocri- 
ty was  apt  to  be  over  all  things. 


CHAPTER  XYI. 

JESUITICAL  PRACTICES. 

THE  best  and  bravest  lose  their  individuality  as 
soon  as  they  find  themselves  at  an  evening  party. 
The  stoutest  heart  quails  when  its  owner  catches 
sight  of  himself  in  a  glass  with  the  remnant  of 
the  inane  smile  he  called  into  being  two  min- 
utes ago,  when  addressing  some  lady  whom  he 
did  not  want  to  address,  and  who  did  not  want 
him  to  address  her. 
4 


It  is  one  of  the  absolute  conditions  that  a 
portion  of  the  "entertainment"  shall  be  ghastly, 
even  though  it  be  held  in  one  of  the  best  houses 
in  London.  If  you  are  in  a  proper  frame  of 
mind,  that  is  to  say,  if  you  are  honourable 
enough  not  to  object  to  occupying  a  permanent 
position  in  the  background,  and  healthy  enough 
to  dare  to  disregard  the  draughts  which  there 
abound,  you  may  derive  the  finest  enjoyment 
from  an  evening  party;  but  not  under  any  other 
circumstances. 

What,  for  instance,  can  be  pleasanter  to  wit- 
ness, than  the  efforts  a  pretty  girl  makes  to  seem 
not  to  be  trying  to  get  away  from  some  one  who 
is  boring  her  awfully  ?  At  the  short  distance  of 
a  yard  and  a  half  from  said  pretty  girl,  is  a 
something  else  (probably  an  awful  bore  also  in 
his  generation),  who  wishes  to  say  something  to 
her  which  she  wishes  to  hear,  or  thinks  for  the 
hour  that  she  wishes  to  hear,  which  comes  to 
the  same  thing,  for  all  practical  purposes.  That 
girl  is  a  victim.  Her  current  shrine  is  an  old 
lady  perhaps,  who  only  speaks  to  and  detains 
her  from  bliss,  because  "  it  would  look  odd  not 
to  speak  to  her,  having  known  her  mother's 
uncle."  Rest  assured  that  the  girl  did  not  adorn 
for  this  sacrifice ;  but  only  see  food  for  mirth  in 
it,  because  it  may  save  her  from  making  a 
worse. 

How  nice  it  is,  too,  to  witness  the  liberal 
manner  in  which  people  who  give  you  worse 
than  nothing,  press  you  to  take  it.  People  who 
do  this  well,  are  really  worth  standing  in  the 
background  in  a  draught  for.  They  have  an 
air  of  modest  faith  in  themselves,  and  of  wish- 
ing you  not  to  over-estimate  their  little  efforts 
on  your  behalf,  that  appeals  to  you  as  Genius 
only  can.  The  hilarious  manner  is  not  a  lasting 
one ;  it  starts  on  a  better  foundation  than  the  ' 
"liberal,"  but  it  is  apt  to  break  down  on  the  first 
appearance  of  gloom  amongst  the  guests.  But 
the  liberal  manner,  being  founded  upon  no- 
thing, flourishes  to  the  last — a  vigorous  impos- 
tor. 

Richer  and  rarer  ("rarer"  in  the  sense  of 
"better")  than  all  other  spectacles  that  the 
evening  party  affords,  is  that  one  of  mem- 
bers of  the  same  family  being  driven  up  into  a 
corner  by  the  exigencies  of  fate,  and  there  being 
compelled  to  talk  company  talk,  with  company 
faces  and  tones.  Which  is  it  ? — sublime  from 
its  blind  gallantry,  or  ridiculous  from  its  fool- 
hardihood,  to  hear  a  brother  discussing  the 
merits  of  "  Faust"  with  his  sister,  or  a  husband 
giving  and  taking  opinions  with  his  wife  about 
the  last  new  novel  ?  They  only  subside  into 
these  topics  when  any  one  approaches,  and  no 
one  is  blinded  for  an  instant.  One  feels  in- 
stinctively that  there  has  been  time  enough  at 
home  for  the  question  to  be  settled,  and  that  it 
is  only  mooted  here  to  avoid  confusion.  Per- 
haps we  are  all  extra  quick  at  this  special  bit 
of  social  detection,  since  we  have  all  been  guilty 
of  the  folly. 

Mrs.  Yane  "  saw  her  friends"  in  precisely  the 
same  way  in  which  other  people  indulge  in  that 
spectacle.  They  came  and  stood  about,  and 
glanced  furtively  at  the  clocks,  and  addressed 
each  other  in  vigorous  accents  whenever  they 
fancied  that  either  the  hostess  or  her  daughter, 
or  any  one  likely  to  mention  to  the  hostess  or 
her  daughter  that  they  looked  dull,  were  look- 


ON  GUARD. 


ing  at  them.  Tn  a  mass  they  looked  like  other 
well-bred,  well-dressed  crowds.  It  was  only 
when  you  analysed  them  that  you  found  Mrs. 
Vane  had  omitted  to  secure  one  that  was  above 
mediocrity. 

Bella  was  very  weary  of  it  all ;  in  that  at 
least — and  to  the  ej^e  of  love  it  was  very  appar- 
ent— there  was  satisfaction.  She  glanced  at 
the  clock  to  the  full  as  frequently  as  any  one 
else,  and  in  this  there  was  joy,  since  she  could 
not  glance  very  often  at  him.  "Do  your  best 
to  make  things  go,  Stanley,"  she  said  to  him 
once.  And  he  replied,  "And  people,  too,  if 
you  like."  At  which  she  shook  her  'head,  and 
whispered,  "  You  see  my  time  in  London  won't 
be  one  of  maddening  excitement — will  it? 
Dear  mamma  does  ask  the  dullest  people." 
After  that  she  had  not  spoken  to  him  any  more, 
and  he  had  borne  his  solitude  nobly,  partly  be- 
cause he  did  believe  in  her  last  assertion,  and 
partly  because  he  received  no  aggravation  from 
the  guitar.  That  instrument,  after  all  the  ela- 
borate preparation  that  had  been  expended 
upon  it,  was  left  to  its  own  devices  in  a  corner, 
where  it  was  gazed  at  fondly  by  a  young  man 
with  tiny  feet  in  cloth  boots,  with  a  big  head, 
who  wished  the  company  to  become  acquainted 
with  the  fact  that  he  warbled  in  Spanish  when- 
ever he  was  asked,  and  who  found  no  good  op- 
portunity for  telling  them  so  in  words  that 
should  induce  them  to  ask  him. 

It  was  all  very  stupid,  and  superficial  in 
fact,  and  no  bewildering  novelty  from  being 
these  things.  Very  many  things  are  stupid  in 
this  world ;  and  the  exceptional  things,  that  we 
dare  to  like,  break  through  quickly,  and  show 
us  how  hollow  they  are.  There  is  nothing  last- 
ing save  dulness  and  disappointment.  Both 
Bella  and  Stanley  Villars  had  come  to  the 
knowledge  of  the  truth  of  this  already,  though 
old  age  was  not  their  portion  yet.  But  for  all 
their  knowledge  of  the  truth,  the  special  form 
then*  own  dulnesses  and  disappointments  took 
seemed  exceptionally  hard. 

People  went  off  as  aimlessly,  apparently,  as 
they  had  come,  about  twelve.  The  only  man 
who  seemed  to  know  what  he  was  going  to  do 
with  himself,  or  to  have  an  object  in  life,  was  a 
stranger  and  a  pilgrim  amongst  them.  Stanley 
had,  at  an  earlier  stage,  asked  this  man's  name, 
of  one  with  whom  he  found  himself  temporarily 
isolated,  and  he  had  been  answered  that  "  it 
was  a  man  on  the  'Extinguisher,'  "  a  daily 
paper,  the  delight  of  millions.  This  man  men- 
tioned at  large  when  he  was  about  departing, 
that  he  was  going  to  "  do  an  article,  and  smoke 
with  some  other  fellows  at  a  tavern  in  the  City ;" 
and  Stanley  Villars  gazed  at  him  over  his  own 
white  cravat  with  exalted  contempt,  and  said  a 
little  sentence  to  himself  respecting  the  prosti- 
tution of  intellect,  and  the  degradation  of  braies. 
He  deemed  that  .the  man  ought  to  have  been 
ashamed  of  himself,  and  despised  him  for  daring 
to  be  happy. 

When  every  one  was  gone  Bella  portrayed 
intense  sleepiness.  "  I,  who  have  nothing 
more  to  do,  feel  such  pity  for  myself  for  being 
tired,"  she  said,  when  she  had  her  bed-room 
candle  in  her  hand.  "How  clever  and  wide- 
awake that  man  looked,  who  has  been  doing 
to  the  full  as  much  as  I  have  done  all  day, 
and  who  now  has  to  go  away  and  rack  his 


brains  to  produce  something  that  may  be  printed 
for  us  to  read  at  breakfast." 

Stanley  looked  down  at  her,  superior  as  a  god. 

"  Those  poor  fellows  have  a  wonderful  power 
of  continuous  work  in  them,"  he  said,  calmly  ; 
"  but  you  must  bear  in  mind  that  their  produc- 
tions are  not  meant  to  outlive  the  day.  Feeling 
them  to  be  ephemeral,  they  do  not  bestow  the 
care  on  their  composition  that  would  involve 
much  brain  work." 

"What  is  ephemeral  in  English,  Stanley? 
Never  mind  explaining  now.  I  am  so  tired, 
that  I  shall  go  off  at  once,  and  congratulate 
myself  to  sleep,  on  not  having  to  write  a  given 
quantity  in  a  given  .time,  that  I  needn't  bestow 
much  brain- work  upon." 

"I  shall  see  you  before  I  leave  in  the  morn- 
ing?" he  asked,  anxiously. 

"Oh,  yes!  of  course,"  she  replied,  arid  then 
Mrs.  Vane  roused  herself  a  little,  and  said — 

"You  won't  go  to-morrow,  surely,  Mr.  Vil- 
lars?" 

"I  shall  leave  you  to  argue  the  question 
with  mamma,"  Bella  interrupted.  "G-ood 
night,  Stanley." 

She  gave  him  her  cheek  to  kiss,  and  he  saw 
that  it  grew  blood-red  under  his  touch.  Eed 
with  a  sudden  fire,  that  almost  scorched  his 
eyes  to  witness.  Red,  with  a  glow  that  scared 
certain  hopes  which  were  newly  springing  in  his 
heart. 

Miss  Vane  did  not  see  Mr.  Villara  the  follow- 
ing morning.  He  had  arranged  to  leave  by  a 
certain  train,  and  she  knew  it,  and  still  did  not 
find  it  convenient  to  rise  in  time  to  see  him  be- 
fore he  started  to  catch  it.  She  sent  down  two 
or  three  delusive  messages  to  the  effect  that  she 
would  make  an  almost  immediate  appearance ; 
so  till  the  last  he  thought  she  was  coming,  and 
drank  his  coffee  in  hope.  But  \qjien  the  Han- 
som  that  had  been  sent  for  to  speed  the  parting 
guest  was  announced,  hope  was  extinguished 
by  Miss  Vane's  maid,  who  met  him  in  the  hall, 
and  told  him  the  truth  somewhat  tardily: 
"Miss  Vane  had  risen  with  one  of  her  very  bad 
headaches,  and  she  (the  maid)  feared  that  there 
was  no  prospect  of  her  being  able  to  come 
down  for  an  hour  or  two  at  least.  Could  Mr. 
Villars  wait?  Would  there  not  be  a  later 
train  ?" 

There  would  be  a  later  train,  but  Mr.  Villars 
could  not  wait.  Unbelief  set  in  strongly  and 
submerged  confiding  love.  He  doubted  that 
headache.  It  had  come  on  rather  too  often 
lately  for  it  to  weigh  with  him  as  once  it  would 
have  done.  The  truth,  or  rather  a  portion  of 
the  truth,  struck  him  vividly.  Bella  did  not 
want  to  see  him,  and  listen  to  what  he  had  to 
say,  until  the  memory  of  Claude  Walsingham 
had  retreated  further  into  the  background.  He 
thought  that  she  craved  time  to  restore  her  to 
her  usual  tone  of  mind.  He  deemed  her  semi- 
conscious of  certain  feelings  which  he  accredited 
her  with  a  desire  to  kill  and  have  done  with  be- 
fore she  saw  him  again.  That  such  feelings 
should  have  obtained  at  all  was  extremely  un- 
desirable, of  course ;  but  he  was  more  lenient 
now  than  he  had  been  in  the  first  days  of  his 
engagement,  the  days  of  complete  security  and 
absolute  faith,  so  he  forgave  her  in  his  heart  for 
evading  him  "  for  awhile,"  and  went  away 
sorry  but  not  angry. 


GUARD. 


51 


There  were  two  flying  visits  that  he  believec 
himself  bound  to  pay  before  quitting  town 
The  one  was  to  his  mother,  the  second  to  his 
brother.  They  were  necessarily  brief;  but 
during  the  first  he  had  time  to  suggest  to  his 
mother  and  sisters  that  frequent  intercourse 
with  Bella  would  be  desirable ;  and  Sir  Geralc 
found  opportunity  for  telling  him  that  the 
"affair,"  meaning  the  engagement,  "was  a 
source  of  great  satisfaction  to  Carrie." 

"  She's  very  good  to  take  such  an  interest  in 
me,"  Stanley  replied;  and  he  could  not  help 
remembering,  and  allowing  it  to  be  perceived, 
that  he  did  remember  how  very  little  interesi 
his  sister-in-law  had  hitherto  taken  in  him.  He 
also  heard  that  the  new  son  and  heir  was  a 
young  thing  that  they  hardly  dared  to  hope 
would  live.  Altogether,  his  latest  London  impres- 
sions were  unpleasant  ones ;  and  still  he  felt  no 
satisfaction  in  going  back  into  the  country. 

It  was  now  August,  and  in  September  the 
climax  was  to  be  brought  about — so,  at  least,  it 
had  been  ordained  when  this  marriage  prospect 
had  been  first  started  between  them.  But  when 
he  had  been  back  at  Denham  a  week,  there  came 
a  letter  from  Bella  pleading  for  a  delay. 

A  letter  that  pained  him,  even  more  from  its 
manner  than  its  matter,  though  that  was  pain- 
ful enough,  heaven  knows,  to  the  man  who 
wanted  this  woman  for  his  wife !  He  had  al- 
ways marked  with  admiration,  always  loved  to 
a  degree,  a  certain  fearlessness  in  Bella  that  led 
her  to  take  the  responsibility  of  her  own  opi- 
nions upon  herself,  even  when  she  knew  them 
unsound  and  antagonistic  to  his  views.  But 
now  there  was  a  touch  less  of  this  fearlessness. 
She  pleaded  for  the  delay  in  their  marriage — 
"not  out  of  the  fulness  of  her  own  heart,"  she 
said,  "but  because  the  instincts  of  her  friends 
were  against  such  a  short  engagement." 

'Wfho  were  these  friends  whose  instincts  dared 
to  step  between  happiness  and  himself?  He 
asked  this  question  fiercely  of  himself.  He  asked 
it  little  less  fiercely  of  her  by  letter.  He  accused 
them  of  tampering  with  her  with  intent  to  wean 
her  from  him — of  being  false  to  him,  whoever 
they  might  be,  and  untrue  to  her  also,  speci- 
ously as  their  counsels  might  be  clothed.  He 
told  her  that  love  such  as  he  had  offered  and 
she  had  accepted  and  re-pledged  to  him,  was  a 
sacred  thing  from  its  intensity — far  too  sacred  a 
thing  for  idle  hands  to  play  with,  or  put  it  aside 
for  a  time.  He  was  far  less  of  the  good  young 
priest  in  this  letter,  in  fact,  than  she  had  antici- 
pated; and  she  realised,  with  an  aching  soul, 
that  he  had  the  passions  of  a  man,  chilling  as 
ne  had  been  to  her  sometimes  at  Denham. 

She  made  no  answer  to  those  strong  appeals 
of  his.  She  wrote  to  him  again  after  an  interval 
of  a  few  days,  but  she  utterly  ignored  the  sub- 
ject— passed  it  over  as  though  it  had  never 
been  mooted.  "  I  did  not  tell  you  when  I  wrote 
before,"  she  said,  "that  I  have  my  ponies;  they 
are  the  chestnuts;  and  even  Florence, who  knows 
so  little  about  horses,  declares  them  to  be  per- 
fection. You  should  see  them  step !  They  are 
quite  equal  to  Major  Walsingham's  greys.  I 
suppose  Florence  has  told  you  that  he  is  in  town 
again  ?  Mamma  is  much  as  usual,  and  I  often 
wish  myself  back  at  Denham."  Then  she  went 
on  to  speak  of  some  new  novel  she  had  been 
ru-ding.  and  new  concert  singer  she  had  been 


hearing;  and  the  letter  drifted  off  into  gene- 
ralities. 

But  his  eyes  went  back,  and  fastened  them- 
selves upon  that  passage  in  which  Claude's  name 
appeared  in  such  a  suspiciously  casual  way, 
before  he  read  the  rest  that  she  had  written. 
He  gave  no  thought  to  the  once-prohibited 
ponies.  They  were  as  nothing  now. 

His  anger  rose  high  against  his  sister  as  he 
read,  "  I  suppose  Florence  has  told  you-  that  he 
is  in  town  again?"  Florence  ought  to  have 
told  him,  have  warned  him — ah !  He  shrank 
within  himself  as  he  thought  of  the  word 
"warned"  him.  Of  what  should  she  "warn" 
him  in  relation  to  Claude,  his  friend,  and  Bella, 
his  future  bride?  He  killed  the  suspicion — or, 
rather,  smothered  it  for  a  time,  and  finished  her 
letter. 

Then  he  turned  to  a  heap  of  other  epistles 
that  were  lying  unopened  on  the  table  before 
him,  and  found  that  there  was  one  from  Claude. 

"  My  dear  Stanley"  (it  ran), 

"I  came  up  to  town,  unexpectedly,  the 
day  before  yesterday.  Curtailed  my  visit  to 
them  at  home  on  account  of  a  change  in  the 
regiment.  I  saw  Florry  yesterday  driving  with 
Miss  Vane ;  this  is  the  first  I  had  seen  of  eithei 
of  them  since  the  Denham  day.  That  affair 
which  I  spoke  to  you  about  is  over.  Be  all 
your  scruples  set  at  rest :  the  lady  wished  to 
back  out  of  it,  therefore  1  had  no  appeal.  Lord 
Lexley  is  the  happy  man  who  has  superseded 
me.  You  wanted  a  dog-pup  of  that  breed  of 
red  setters  of  my  brother  Jack's  once  I  remem- 
ber. Are  you  still  in  the  mind  for  one  ?  If 
you  are,  you  will  find  one  at  your  service  any 
day  you  like  to  look  in  at  my  quarters  and  take 
him. 

"  Yours  affectionately, 

"  CLAUDE  WALSINGHAM." 

Stanley  Villars  read  that  letter  over  many 
times,  and,  save  in  one  small  respect,  it  was 
entirely  satisfactory.  He  could  but  feel  that 
there  was  no  desire  on  Claude's  part  to  steal 
a  march  on  him.  Claude  came  back  to  town, 
on  service,  as  he  said,  and  immediately  signal- 
ized that  return  frankly,  and  as  frankly  avowed 
that  he  had  seen  Miss  Vane.  There  was  no 
concealment,  no  evasion,  no  anything  that 
there  ought  not  to  be.  He  had  seen  Miss 
Vane  and  Florence ;  and  he  mentioned  the 
fact  of  having  seen  them,  just  as  any  other 
man  writing  to  a  familiar  friend,  would  have 
mentioned  it.  So  far  all  was  satisfactory. 

It  was  satisfactory,  too,  to  know  that  the 
engagement  Claude  had  entered  into  so  lightly 
had  been  broken  off  in  an  equally  airy  manner 
-^by  the  lady  too!  so  that  no  blame  could 
attach  to  Claude.  It  gave  him  great  pleasure 
to  read  this  statement,  on  the  whole,  though  a 
portion  of  the  phrasing — "  the  lady  wished  to 
back  out  of  it,  therefore  I  had  no  appeal " — 
grated  on  him  harshly. 

But  what  was  not  pleasant  about  Claude's 
letter  was  the  manner  in  which  he  subscribed 
himself.  The  words  "  always  truly  "  had  been 
written  first,  but  they  had  been  dashed  out 
with  a  stroke  of  the  pen,  and  the  word  "  affec- 
tionately "  had  been  substituted.  He  asked 
"limself,  had  doubts  arisen  in  Claude's  mind  as 


ON  GUARD. 


to  whether  he  should  be  "  always  true "  to 
Stanley,  and,  with  the  doubt,  some  of  the  old 
schoolboy  warmth  of  affection  dictating  the 
altered  expression  ? 

He  wrote  to  his  sister  and  questioned  her 
guardedly,  and  felt  like  a  Jesuit  the  while. 
Florence  was  so  thoroughly  true,  so  extremely 
unreserved,  so  entirely  above  suspicion,  that  he 
felt  mean  in.  being  thus  guarded.  But  then 
again  he  knew  that  whatever  he  wrote  would 
be  passed  on  to  Bella,  and  this  reflection  in- 
duced him  to  couch  the  letter,  whose  mission 
it  was  to  gain  evidence  about  her,  in  very 
guarded  terms. 

Florence's  reply  came  in  due  time.  It  was 
on  rose-tinted  paper  and  in  rose-tinted  terms ; 
it  was  indited  in  a  palpable  tremor  of  happiness. 
"  Tou  ask  about  Bella's  ponies ;  they  are  beau- 
tiful, and  she  drives  them  charmingly.  "We  go 
into  the  park  every  morning — that  is,  we  have 
been  there  three  mornings  and  come  back  here 
to  luncheon,  and  Claude  comes  too.  He  says 
if  you  won't  come  up  for  that  puppy,  that  I 
shall  have  it.  Do  you  consent  ?" 

Stanley  discovered  little,  save  that  Claude 
was  in  the  ascendant  with  Florry,  and  that  he 
had  known  before. 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

A  LAST  FAYOR. 

HAVE  you  ever  felt  a  fever  or  an  ague-fit  com- 
ing on,  and  striven  to  cheat  yourself  into  the 
belief  that  it  was  "only"  a  chill,  or  a  heat,  or 
i  something  which  you  knew  all  the  while  it 
was  not  ?  To  the  very  last,  till  you  are  utterly 
worsted,  till  you  are  completely  overthrown, 
till  "keeping  up"  any  longer  becomes  of  no 
avail  even  in  your  own  eyes,  till  Nature  will 
not  JDB  lied  to  any  longer,  you  deceive  yourself, 
and  say  that  it  is  not  what  you  dread  it  to  be. 

As  with  the  bodily  ailment,  so  with  the  fever 
or  ague-fit  of  the  mind.  We  may  feel  miserably 
sure  that  by-and-by,  in  due  course  of  time,  we 
may  be  compelled  to  succumb  to  it  altogether ; 
but  until  we  are  so  compelled,  we  affect  extra 
health  and  security,  and,  alas!  the  affectation 
deceives  no  one,  not  even  ourselves. 

That  August  was  a  period  of  sultry,  soul-sub- 
duing suspicion,  of  burning  fear,  of  harassing 
perplexity  and  doubt,  to  Stanley  Villars.  He 
was  very  orthodox  up  to  this  date — orthodox 
in  social  as  well  as  in  religious  matters.  An 
engagement  to  enter,  at  no  distant  date,  into  a 
union  for  life,  was  no  light  thing  in  his  eyes ; 
and  the  one  with  whom  he  had  entered  into  it 
seemed  to  regard  it  so  lightly,  so  very  lightly ! 

It  will  be  well  to  record  the  events  of  fliis 
period  briefly.  It  will  be  wise,  if  I  would 
"  hold  my  readers  " — the  novelist's  proudest 
triumph !—  to  come  quickly  to  that  point  from 
whence  the  chief  interest  of  my  story  will  flow 
— to  pass  on,  without  halting,  to  that  time 
which  passed  over  my  hero's  head  in  agony, 
and  left  him  broken  down. 

During  the  greater  part  of  that  weary  month 
he  strove  as  hardly  as  man  may  strive  to  ab- 
sorb himself  in  his.  duties,  and  be  a  priest  of 
God.  He  was  constant  in  prayer ;  he  rang  the 


villagers  up  at  unheard-of  hours,  and  caused 
them  to  be  sleepily  devotional  at  times  when 
nought  save  their  virtuous  couches  had  known 
them  heretofore.  He  was  incessant  in  sickness ; 
visiting,  attending,  relieving,  in  a  way  that 
brought  down  blessings  that  were  heart-felt  on 
his  head.  He  would  not  relax  in  a  single 
thing !  He  did  all  that  was  to  be  done  in  his 
vocation,  and  he  did  it  thoroughly ;  and  still 
he  had  time  to  think — time  to  be  all  a  human 
being — nothing  more. 

Time  was  lightened  and  life  brightened  occa- 
sionally by  letters  from  Bella  Vane.  He  took 
such  comfort  as  he  might  in  them,  marking  how 
kind  they  strove  to  be,  and  how  unconstrainedly 
Claude  "Walsingham  was  mentioned  in  them, 
and  how  regularly  they  came.  The  very  thing 
that  should  have  warned  him  lulled  him  into 
greater  security ;  he  had  yet  to  learn  that  love 
has  no  routine — that  there  is  no  red-tapeism 
about  real  passion. 

Time  stood  still,  and  life  darkened  to  the 
darkness  of  death  at  last,  one  day  when  he 
received  a  letter  from  her,  telling  him  that  she 
could  not  keep  the  vow  she  had  made.  "  He 
would  hate  and  despise  and  forget  her.  For 
this  she  was  prepared.  She  only  craved  his 
permission  to  go  and  bury  her  fallen  head  in 
freedom." 

This  was  the  whole  purport  of  her  letter,  but 
he  felt  that  there  must  be  more  behind  it,  and 
he  cursed  the  cause  of  such  a  change  in  her,  his 
cherished  love.  He  knew  that  Bella  Yane  was 
not  a  girl  to  forfeit  all  that  was  sweet  and 
warm  and  thrilling  in  life  for  the  sake  of  going 
away  to  hide  in  solitude.  What  he  had  lost 
another  had  won — for  Bella's  heart  was  like 
Nature,  in  that  it  could  not  endure  a  vacuum. 
He  knew  this  at  once,  and  the  knowledge  made 
his  heart  stand  still  with  a  great  rage  that 
nothing  could  cast  out;  not  even  the  recollection 
that  he  was  a  minister  of  that  Gospel  which 
inculcates  forgiveness  of  our  enemies,  to  say 
nothing  of  good- will  towards  all  men. 

He  answered  her  prayer  for  release,  and  her 
supplication  to  be  ignored  by  him,  from  that 
time  forth  for  evermore,  by  going  up  and  seeing 
her.  This  he  did  with  no  weak  desire,  no  faint 
hope  of  turning  her  from  her  purpose,  but  simply 
because  he  burnt  to  learn  from  her  own  lips 
how  that  purpose  had  been  born. 

His  going  up  at  this  juncture  laid  bare  an- 
other misery  to  him ;  his  life  seemed  full  of 
gaping  wounds,  poor  fellow !  and  he  was  pow- 
erless to  stop  the  bleeding  of  any  one  of  them. 

Miss  Yane  had  nothing  to  offer  in  extenua- 
tion of  this  change  which  had  come  over  her. 
He  asked  for  none  indeed ;  he  was  only  guilty 
of  the -minor  folly  of  asking  her  "  why  she  had 
not  told  him  before  ?"  She  was  a  great  beauty, 
and  was  in  such  a  position  that  no  one  could 
say  her  nay ;  but  for  all  that,  she  knew  herself 
to  be  a  pitiable  spectacle  as  she  stood  before  the 
man  whose  heart  she  had  crushed,  with  so  little 
to  say  for  herself,  which  he  could  not  read  by 
the  light  of  this  new  revelation. 

The  last  few  scenes  in  the  first  act  of  this 
drama  shall  be  placed  before  you  speedily. 

There  was  a  faint  touch  of  ghastly  humour 
over  the  final  one  in  which  he  played  a  part 
when  he  went  up  to  town.  He  was  ushered 
unexpectedly  into  a  room  where  the  girl  sai, 


ON  GUARD. 


53 


with  her  mother — the  same  room  in  which  Mrs. 
Yane  had  seen  her  friend.  His*  sudden  appear- 
ance startled  the  quiet  lady;  she  almost  be- 
lieved that  he  had  come  to  put  an  end  to  all 
further  discussion  and  doubt  by  insisting  upon 
Bella's  marrying  him  that  moment.  Almost 
believed,  and  quite  hoped  it;  for,  as  she  had 
plaintively  remarked  to  Bella  several  times 
since  the  latter  had  told  her  that  it  was  to 
be  broken  off,  "  "What  shall-  I  say  when  peo- 
ple ask  me  about  it  ?  I  would  give  worlds 
— yes,  worlds — that  this  could  be  avoided, 
Bella!" 

Thereupon  Bella  had  told  her  mother  some- 
what peremptorily  that  it  could  not  be  avoided, 
and  that  therefore  the  best  had  better  be  made  of 
it.  "  Besides,  mamma,  I  don't  see  why  you 
should  feel  bound  to  give  an  account  of  it ;  you 
were  not  the  one  who  was  going  to  marry  him, 
and  now  you're  not  the  one  who  is  not  going 
to  marry  him." 

"  Mrs.  Melville  has  been  so  very  much  inter- 
ested, that  she  will  come  to  me  about  it  directly 
it  gets  abroad ;  I  know  she  will!"  Mrs.  Yane' 
urged  almost  tearfully.  "  "What  will  your  guardi- 
ans say  ?  What  will  people  think  ?" 

"  Really,  mamma,  I  don't  care  what  they 
think,"  Bella  replied,  coldly;  "  there  is  no  sting 
to  me  in  public  opinion  about  such  a  matter  as 
this — it  is  too  entirely  to  ourselves." 

"It's  terrible — after  all  your  things  are  made, 
too !"  Mrs.  Yane  went  on,  not'  heeding  her 
daughters  words. 

"That's  the  least  part  of  it,  dear  mother," 
said  Bella.  "  Don't  prick  me  with  trifles !  I  am 
sorry  enough." 

"Then  why  break  it  off?"  Mrs.  Yane  re- 
sponded; "I  hope  you  won't.  I  do  so  dread 
being  questioned  and  having  to  tell  the  whole 
story,  for  I'm  sure  I  don't  understand  it!" 

"Then  you  can  plead  ignorance,  and  save 
yourself  the  trouble." 

"  That  will  strike  people  as  being  most  extra- 
ordinary," Mrs.  Yane  replied,  gently  shrugging 
her  shoulders.  If  mild  advice,  that  she  had  not 
to  move  to  offer,  might  possibly  avert  these 
evils,  Mrs.  Yane  was  ready  to  offer  it. 

_"  I  do  not  care  whether  it  strikes  people  as 
being  extraordinary  or  not,"  Bella  answered, 
speaking  with  a  passionate  energy,  that  came 
partly  from  the  conviction  that  she  was  acting 
ill  towards  another,  and  partly  from  a  suspicion 
that  others  had  not  always  acted  well  by  her. 
"  If  they  knew,"  she  went  on  recklessly,  "  it 
might  strike  them  as  a  little  extraordinary  also, 
that  you  have  never  taken  the  smallest  trouble 
to  find  out  what  I  was  doing  or  going  to  do  all 
my  life ;  you  left  me  to  get  new  toys  for  myself 
when  I  broke  my  old  ones,  when  I  was  a 
child! — let  me  do  the  same  now!" 

"  Really,  Bella,  I  have  no  desire  to  interfere 
with  you;  but  I  shall  not  know  what  to  say 
when  people  question  me." 

"  Refer  them  to  me  for  an  answer,  if  you 
like."  Then  her  face  softened  suddenly,  and'she 
added,  "  Oh,  mother !  I  wish  that  what  a  pack  of 
idle,  curious,  gossiping  old  women  may  say 
about  it  were  the  worst  I  had  to  dread  I  I  do 
suffer,  indeed  I  do ;  but  it  is  about  something  so 
widely  different.  The  common  cry  will  never 
cut  me — how  can  you  care  for  it?" 

Mrs.  Yane  thought  she  saw  a  good  opening 


for  the  insertion  of  the  small  end  of  an  argu- 
ment, capable  of  overturning  everything. 

"  Because  I  think  it  a  most  shocking  thing, 
as  does  every  one  else  who  thinks  properly. 
Prom  the  moment  I  was  engaged' to  your  father, 
or,  at  any  rate,  from  the  moment  my  trousseau 
was  commenced,  I  no  more1  thought  it  possible 
to  break"  it  off,  than  I  would  have  thought  it 
creditable  to  run  away  from  him  after  I  was 
married.  If  you  could  fulfil  your  engagement 
to  Mr.  Yillars,  it  would  be  very  much  better." 

"  It  would  be  very  much  better,  but  I  can't," 
Bella  replied,  curtly ;  and  she  had  hardly  utter- 
ed the  words  before  Stanley  Yillars  came  into 
the  room. 

Bella  was  not  surprised  to  see  him.  When 
she  wrote  and  begged  him  to  forget  her  at  once 
and  for  ever,  she  knew  that  he  would  not  do 
so ;  she  felt  sure  that  he  would  come.  She  had 
seen,  as  in  a  vision,  the  very  expression  that 
was  on  his  face  as  he  entered. 

They  shook  hands,  and  Bella  found  it  so  like 
the  ordinary  meeting  of  ordinary  mortals  who 
were  not  about  to'  cut  each  other  to  the  quick, 
that  she  commenced  the  conventional  "lam 
very  happy  to  see  you."  But  she  checked  her- 
self at  the  third  word,  and  sat  down  with  a 
trembling  in  both  her  tongue  and  knees. 

"  I  was  saying  to  Bella,  just  before  you  came 
in,"  Mrs.  Yane  began  by  way  of  putting  them 
at  then"  ease ;  "  that  I  am  very,  very  much  con- 
cerned at  all  this,  Mr.  Yillars;  I  hope,  now  you 
have  come " 

"Mother!  mother!"  Bella  interrupted,  plead- 
ingly, "  don't  say  anything — there  is  nothing  tc 
be  said." 

He  had  seated  himself  also  when  Bella  broke 
down  in  her  welcoming  phrase,  and  now  he  was 
resting  his  chin  on  his  hand,  leaning  on  the 
table,  and  looking  at  her  fixedly. 

"  There  is  nothing  to  be  said!"  he  repeated 
after  her.  "  Yes,  there  is  one  thing  to  say ;  I 
have  one  last  favour  to  ask  of  you !" 

She  made  a  deprecating;  movement  with  her 
hands.  This  giving-up  tone  into  which  he  had 
fallen  stabbed  her  more  than  reproaches  would 
have  done.  She  felt  now  how  she  had  wronged 
him,  when  she  supposed  that  he  would  strive 
to  keep  her  to  himself  at  any  cost — to  her. 

"  Don't  speak  in  that,  way  1" — she  almost  sob- 
bed the  words  out.  "  Oh !  if  you  knew — if  you 
knew  " 

There  was  nothing  cruel  or  hard  in  her  na- 
ture. She  could  stab,  and  wound,  and  wrong ; 
but  her  heart  bled  the  while  she  did  these 
things.  Her  worst  fault  was  instability. 

"  I  will  say  it  to  Claude,  then,"  he  answered  ; 
"one  of  you  must  hear  me." 

At  the  mention  of  Claude's  name,  Bella  gave 
a  little,  guilty,  quickly  subdued  start,  and  Mrs. 
Yane  asked,  "Who's  Claude?"  in  a  tone  that, 
miserable  as  he  was,  brought  the  advertisement 
"Who's  Griffiths?"  with  which  enterprise  has 
adorned  the  walls  of  our  metropolis,  vividly  be- 
fore Mr.  Yillars'  eyes. 

"It  is  not  his  fault,"  Bella  began;  "if  any 
one  is  to  blame " 

"There  is  no  one  to  blame  in  the  matter," 
Stanley  muttered  impatiently;  "no  one  is  to 
blame — only  I  am  damned  unfortunate!" 

She  knew  how  she  had  wrung  him  then, 
when  she  heard  him  say  that.  She  dared  not 


54 


ON  GUARD. 


reprove  him  for  the  force  of  that  expression: 
she  scarcely  dared  to  look  as  if  she  had  heard 
it.  She  trembled  for  him,  and  for  herself,  and 
above  all,  for  Claude,  should  Stanley  go  to  him 
in  this  frame  of  mind.  Besides,  she  would  be 
shamed  by  his  going  to  Claude,  for  between 
Claude  and  herself  there  had  been  no  words — 
no  shadow  of  an  explanation  that  could  justify 
his  being  incriminated  with  her  in  this  evil. 
Still,  on  such  light  accusation  as  Stanley  had 
made,  would  she  be  justified  in  attempting  to 
excuse  herself?  There  was  but  one  course  for 
her  to  pursue;  she  was  a  woman,  and  she 
threw  up  her  hand. 

'  ' '  Claude  does  not  know  what  I  have  done — 
he  would  never  have  asked  me  to  do  it.  Don't 
hurt  him,  Stanley.  Don't  blame  him!" 

She  called  him  "  Stanley  "  with  all  the  tender- 
ness she  so  well  knew  how  to  throw  into  her 
tone ;  but  though  his  own  name  was  uttered, 
the  tenderness  was  for  his  rival  now. 

Disloyal  as  she  had  been  to  him,  desperately 
as  he  had  been  deceived  in  her,  he  could  but 
feel  tenderly,  pityingly  towards  her,  as  the 
pleading  tones  fell  upon  his  ears,  and  the 
anxious  eyes  met  his  own.  He  forgot  in  that 
moment  that  soon  tenderness  and  pity  felt  for 
her  would  be  treading  on  dangerous  ground  for 
himself,,  and  on  treacherous  ground  as  regarded 
the  friend  who  had  been  treacherous  to  him. 
He  forgot  everything,  even  the  presence  of  her 
mother,  as  he  went  up  to  her  and  held  her  in  a 
strong  embrace,  from  which  she  could  not  free 
herself. 

"My  lovel  I  would  hold  you  here  against 
God,  and  the  world,  and  the  devil,  if  you  cared 
to  stay — if  I  could  1" 

The  agony  he  felt  in  his  full  consciousness  of 
his  powerlessness  to  do  it,  came  out  in  the 
hoarse  fervour  with  which  he  uttered  the  last 
three  words.  She  dared  not  struggle  against 
that  embrace. 

"  If  I  could,  if  I  could !"  he  repeated  hotly ; 
and,  as  in  a  glass,  she  saw  dimly  a  day  in  the 
far  future  when  her  heart  should  be  chilled,  and 
should  yearn  for  a  particle  of  that  fiery  passion- 
ate heart  to  which  now  it  could  not  respond. 

Suddenly  he  released  her,  and  she  staggered 
and  sat  down  on  the  chair  from  which  he  had 
raised  her,  her  eyes  still  fixed  on  his  face  appa- 
rently, but  in  reality  on  that  visionary  future 
day.  By  a  strong  effort  he  conquered  his  emo- 
tion presently — conquered  it,  that  is,  sufficiently 
to  hear  and  comprehend  Mrs.  Yane's  mild 
"Pray  be  calm,  Mr.  Yillars!"  and  to  realise 
that  the  effect  of  such  an  embrace  on  a  woman 
who  no  longer  loved  would  be  to  disgust  her 
with  him  further.  The  thought,  the  possibility, 
struck  him  with  a  new  despair;  he  could  not 
be  banished,  be  hated,  be  left  in  every  way  by 
this  woman  who  had  sunk  into  his  soul ! 

"Forgive  me !" — he  asked  it  as  humbly  as  if 
he  had  injured  her.  "  Bella,  let  me  be  your 
friend  and  his,  and  I  will  never  be  mad  or 
offend  you  again!" 

She  tried  to  smile,  and  the  effort  broke 
down  her  self-control,  and  caused  the  tears  to 
flow  out  freely  from  the  sweet,  kind-looking 
blue  ej  es,  that  would  always  go  on  seeking, 
seeking  still  something  more  to  look  fondly 
upon.  Then  she  gave  him  her  hand,  and,  as 
he  pressed  it,  and  poured  forth  some  incoherent 


words  about  being  permitted  "to  watch  over 
and  guard  her  still,"  the  black  retriever,  faith- 
ful Rock,  came  out  wagging  his  tail,  and  almost 
smiling,  and  stood  up  against  him,  licking  the 
hands  thus  linked  together. 

"Will  you  take  Rock?"  she  asked  in  a 
whisper;  "he's  very  fond  of  you." 

He  saw  that  it  was  some  sort  of  poor  salve  to 
her  conscience  to  give  him  the  dog  that  was 
dear  to  her.  He  felt  that  she  would  be  the 
happier  for  this  poor  bond  still  existing  between 
them,  and  with  that  curious  clinging  to  what 
might  be  left  to  him  of  the  old — with  a  strange 
gratitude  for  such  a  man  to  feel — he  took  the 
crumbs  that  fell  from  the  rich  man's  table :  he 
accepted  the  boon. 

"I  will  take  your  last  gift;  and  now,  good- 
bye. I  shall  not  see  you  again  till  your  wed- 
ding-day." Then  he  bent  his  head  down  and 
whispered,  "  The  favour  I  shall  ask  of  Claude  is, 
that  I  may  marry  you  to  him  !" 


CHAPTER  XYIII. 

BROKEN  OFF. 

THE  light  was  dim,  though  not  remarkably  reli- 
gious, in  Claude  Walsingham's  quarters,  when 
Stanley  Yillars  entered  them  that  night,  some 
hours  after  that  last  scene  with  Miss  Yane.  An 
aromatic  haze  hung  over  all  things,  and  through 
it  the  forms  of  three  men  loomed  largely.  "  A 
smoking  orgie,"  Stanley  thought,  with  a  mo- 
mentary disgust :  "  it's  neither  the  time  nor  the 
place  to  speak  of  her;  and  yet  she  must  be 
spoken  of  before  Claude  and  I  part  again." 

He  went  in,  and  sat  down  in  a  low  chair,  at 
the  end  of  the  couch  on  which  Major  "Walsing- 
ham  had  been  lounging,  when  he  entered, 
Claude  meeting  and  greeting  him  as  he  came 
along,  and  noticing  the  dog  Rock,  who  fol- 
lowed close  at  "his  heels,  with  an  angry  wonder 
that  he  (Claude)  was  unable  to  conceal  from 
Stanley. 

"  Glad  to  see  you,  old  fellow.  Is  this  meant 
as  a  delicate  hint  that  you  don't  want  the  set- 
ter pup?"  Major  Walsingham  asked,  patting 
Rock  on  the  head ;  and  Stanley  answered — 

"It  is  not  meant  as  a  delicate  hint  about 
anything — that  you're  not  well  acquainted  with 
already."  This  he  said  in  so  low  a  voice  that 
the  other  two  men  could  not  hear  him.  Claude 
heard  him,  however,  and  leant  forward  tender- 
ing him  a  cigar  and  a  light  from  the  end  of  his 
own,  and  asked — 

"  What  is  it,  Stanley?  speak  out!" 

Stanley  gave  two  little  puff's,  and  the  cigar 
caught  the  spark  from  the  end  of  the  one  that 
was  a  burning  and  shining  light  in  the  mouth 
of  his  friend.  Then  he  leant  back,  saying — 

"  The  dog  is  all  that  I'm  to  have :  you  won't 
grudge  me  that,  will  you  ?" 

"They  leave  me  at  ten  to  see  the  last  act  of 
Fidelio:'  wait    till  they're  gone,   for    God's 
sake!"  Claude  replied  hurriedly.     He  saw  that 
Stanley  Yillars  was  in  a  humour  to  speak  out 
and  say*  rash  things,  perhaps,  without  a  care  or 
a  thought  of  who  heard  them.     Foreseeing  the\ 
nature,  in  a  measure,  of  those  things,  he  was  '(,' 
desirous  to  stay  the  saying  of  them  till  such 


ON  GUARD. 


55 


time  as  they  (Stanley  and  he)  should  be  alone 
together. 

The  two  men  who  were  sharing  in  what 
Stanley  Villars  had  declared  to  himself  to  be  a 
"smoking  orgie"  when  he  entered,  were  two 
of  the  same  men  who  had  gone  down  to  Rich- 
mond on  the  drag  that  warm  July  night,  and 
congratulated  Claude  on  his  victory  over  many 
things.  They  were  not  gifted  with  extraordi- 
nary perceptive  faculties,  still  they  had  marked 
that  Claude  seemed  rather  more  than  a  "trifle 
taken  with  the  girl  who  was  going  to  throw 
herself  away  upon  a  country  parson."  They 
had  seen  him  bring  his  greys  up  abreast  of  her 
chestnuts  several"  times  in  the  drive.  They  had 
observed  him  fa-r  back  in  her  mother's  box  at 
the  opera,  even  when  Circe  sang.  They  had 
seen  him  riding  by  her  side  in  the  Row,  which 
last  sight  was  conclusive  evidence  in  their  eyes 
that  he  was  "going  to  try  it  on  with  her," 
his  detestation  of  the  Row  being  an  understood 
thing.  Stanley  Villars'  advent  appeared  to  af- 
ford promise  of  a  piquant  study.  They  there- 
fore resolved  to  forego  "Fidelio,"  and  abide  the 
issue  of  said  advent  here  in  Claude's  room. 

The  hour — ten — approached,  arrived,  passed : 
all  four  men  began  to  get  impatient.  The  old 
friends,  who  felt  themselves,  and  were  felt  by 
these  comparative  strangers,  to  be  rivals,  wanted 
to  be  alone  in  order  to  say  those  things  to  each 
other  which  the  interlopers  trusted  might  leak 
out  under  the  influence  of  wine,  smoke,  and  ex- 
citement. Unfortunately,  however,  as  far  as 
their  curiosity  was  concerned,  both  Claude  and 
Stanley  were  gentlemen.  No  vintage  so  po- 
tent as  to  make  them  forget  the  respect  due  to 
a  lady's  name,  small  cause  as  one  of  them  had 
for  so  respecting  her. 

Still  their  hearts,  and  heads,  and  thoughts, 
were  all  too  hot  for  cool,  sensible  converse  to 
be  within  the  bounds  of  possibility,  when  they 
were  finally  left  alone.  The  "  good  nights  "  of 
Claude's  unwanted  guests  had  scarcely  ceased 
echoing  in  then*  ears  when  Stanley  Villars 
commenced — 

"I  have  seen  Miss  Vane  to-day,"  and  stop- 
ped abruptly,  thinking  over  how  he  had  sworn 
to  himself  not  to  see  her  as  Miss  Vane  again  till 
the  day  when  he  should  unite  her  to  his  friend. 

"Well!"  Claude  answered  doggedly.  He 
felt  guilty,  how  guilty!  True  he  had  never 
spoken  words  to  her  that  should  not  have  fallen 
on  the  ears  of  the  betrothed  bride  of  his  friend ; 
but  the  manner  of  his  refraining  from  such 
words  had  been  fraught  with-  a  tender  danger 
that  no  spoken  words  could  have  aggravated, 
and  he  knew  it.  I  do  not  think  that  he  felt 
repentant  at  that  moment,  but  unquestionably 
he  felt  guilty ;  and  feeling  so,  feeling  guilty,  and 
grieved  for  himself  and  for  her,  and  for  this  old 
friend  who  had  made  the  romance  of  his  boy- 
hood, he  answered,  doggedly,  "Well!" 

"Well!"  Stanley  repeated  after  him;  "is  it 
well?  You  shall  hear  and  judge.  She  was  to 
have  been  my  wife,  you  know ;  she  was  to  have 
been  my  wife  this  month!  I  loved  her  so — 
I  loved  her  so,  that  I  would  have  given  my 
life,  my  soul,  by  God,  for  her!  Don't  look  at 
the  brandy, Claude;  I'm  not  drunk!  I'm  not 
avowing  a  readiness  to  go  to  perdition  under 
any  other  intoxicating  influence  than  the  in- 
toxication of  disappointment.  'Well, 'as  you 


said  just  now,  the  dog  is  all  that  is  left  to  me 
of  the  dream.  She  can't  keep  her  vow  now  her 
love  has  left  me.  Do  you  hear  me,  old  fellow  ?'' 

He  did  not  look  in  his  friend's  face  as  he 
asked  "did  he  hear?"  He  sat  down  again, 
and  covered  his  eyes"  with  his  hands,  and  the 
dog  that  she  had  given  him  stood  up  and  licked 
away  the  tears  that  were  oozing  through  his 
fingers.  Thus  he  sat,  thus  Rock  and  himself 
grouped  themselves  for  a  few  minutes,  during 
which  Major  Walsingham  went  through  the 
elementary  white  bear  evolutions  up  and  down 
the  length  o£  the  room. 

Claude  was  horribly  perplexed.  He  did  not 
know  what  to  say ;  more,  he  did  not  know 
what  to  think:  worse  than  this  even,  he 
could  not  decide  on  what  it  would  sound 
well  to  say.  The  position  was  an  awfully  un- 
pleasant one;  for  he  had  loved  Stanley  as 
warmly  as  he  had  loved  any  one  till  this  wo- 
man with  the  flickering  eyelashes  and  flicker- 
ing faith  had  come  between  them.  He  could 
not  deem  himself  wholly  blameless  in  the  mat- 
ter either ;  and  yet  it  would  be  a  task  of  no 
small  difficulty  to  say  in  so  many  set  words 
how  he  had  erred. 

He  brought  his  promenade  to  a  termination  at 
last,  and  stood  close  by  Stanley's  shoulder. 

"  I'd  give  half  my  life  that  none  of  this  had 
occurred!"  he  said,  softly. 

"Too  late!  it  has  occurred!" 

"It  has,  as  you  say,"  Claude  went  on,  speak- 
ing in  a  firmer  tone  than  the  one  in  which  he 
had  uttered  his  previous  words;  "it  has  occur- 
red; bear  it  like  a  man,  old  fellow!" 

The  other  dropped  the  concealing  hands — 
dropped  them  down  on  the  honest  head  of  the 
tawny  dog  who  was  standing  close  up  to  him, 
and  raised  his  pale,  pain-lined  face.  That's 
devilish  easy  for  you  to  say,  Claude,"  he  said 
slowly.  "  In  losing  her  I  lose  my  faith  in  all 
I  have  had  faith  in  hitherto — in  God  and  man, 
and,  worse  than  all,  in  myself;  it  has  all  gone 
at  one  blow." 

"It  will  come  back.  We  have  all  gone 
through  this  sort  of  thing." 

"  Have  you  ?  By  heaven,  no !  If  you  had, 
you  would  never  have  put  me  through  it," 
Stanley  interrupted.  It  was  the  first  allusion 
either  of  them  had  made  to  Claude's  share  in 
this  disruption  in  the  established  order  of  things. 
Major  Walsingham  said  nothing  in  reply  to  this 
immediately.  He  was  feeling  that  if  he  noticed 
it  and  defended  himself,  it  would  have  the  ap- 
pearance of  casting  the  reflection  upon  Bella 
that  she  had  been  over  easy  to  win,  and  this  he 
scorned  to  do,  though  Miss  Vane  certainly  had 
"had  no  cunning  to  be  strange,"  as  far  as  be 
was  concerned. 

After  a  brief  period  of  silence  he  spoke — 

'VWhy  did  you  keep  me  at  Denham,  when  I 
wanted  to  come  away  ?  " 

"Don't  speak  about  it!  "  Stanley  said,  mise- 
rably. Then  he  added,  in  that  contradictory 
spirit  which  is  so  symptomatic  of  the  disease 
under  which  he  was  labouring,  "You  have 
seen  her  here  in  town ;  leaving  Denham  would 
have  been  of  no  avail.  Don't  explain — don't 
excuse  yourself  by  telling  me  how  it  has  been 
done ;  why  should  you  ?  all  is  fair  in  love  or 
war." 

"Stanley!    on  my  honour,  there   has  been 


56 


ON  GUARD. 


nothing  premeditated !  'All  is  fair.'  What  are 
you  thinking  of?  I  would  have  cut  off  my 
right  hand  sooner  than  run  against  you  in  such 
a  race.  It's  fate,  old  fellow — blind  fortune. 
Don't  you  think  I  suffer  as  much  in  winning,  if 
I  have  won,  from  you,  as  I  should  in  losing  to 
any  other  man  ?  Can  you  not  believe  me  ?  Is 
this  thing  to  come  between  us  and  blot  out  the 
warm  feelings  and  the  confidence  of  years? 
By  God,  no  woman's  worth  it ! — no,  not  the 
sweetest  and  purest  that  ever  stepped  i  " 

'•Don't  undervalue  what  you  have  gained. 
There  will  be  poor  comfort  to  me  in  the  thought 
that  she  may  possibly  be  judged  less  highly  by 
you  than  she  would  have  been  by  me  if  she- 
could — have — kept  to  me."  His  voice  faltered 
a  little  as  he  said  this,  and  Claude  turned  away 
impatiently.  Had  Major  Walsingham  alone 
been  concerned,  he  would  willingly  at  that  mo- 
ment have  restored  Miss  Vane  to  Stanley ;  he 
really  did  feel  that  no  woman  was  worthy  of 
this  sorrow  that  could  even  temporarily  subdue 
such  manliness.  The  game  was  a  pretty  one 
enough,  and  an  interesting  one  to  play,  but 
scarcely  worth  the  candle. 

But  he  was  not  alone  concerned.  Bella  had 
put  forth  all  her  strength,  and  broken  the 
bonds ;  or  she  had  exerted  all  her  feminine  inge- 
nuity, and  wriggled  out  of  them.  It  was  out 
of  his  power  to  re-adjust  them  on  Stanley's 
behalf.  There  was  nothing  to  be  done,  save  to 
make  the  best  of  it. 

"  Look  here,  old  fellow,  we  only  torture  each 
other  by  talking  about  it ;  from  the  bottom  of 
my  soul  I  regret  my  share  in  the  business." 

"  From  the  bottom  of  mine  I  forgive  you," 
poor  Stanley  replied ;  "  we'll  have  done  with 
the  topic  for  ever,  if  you  will,  when  you  have 
answered  me  one  question — granted  me  one 
favour." 

11  Ask  it." 

"  Let  me  be  the  one  to  join  you  to  her  when 
you  do  marry  her  ?  " 

Claude  moved  uneasily ;  this  request  seemed 
to  him  romantic  in  the  last  degree — romantic, 
foolish,  idle — everything  that  was  most  unlike 
Stanley  Villars.  He  no  more  fathomed  the 
motive  which  had  dictated  it  than  did  the  dog 
which  stood  gazing  at  him  while  he  hesitated 
to  answer  it. 

"I  don't  attach  much  importance  to  the 
'  holy  ceremony,'  you  know,"  he  said  at  last ; 
"  it's  womanly,  though,  not  to  be  satisfied  with 
a  civil  contract." 

"The  'holy  ceremony,'"  Stanley  repeated 
after  him ;  "at  any  rate,  I  may  as  well  perform 
it  as  any  other  man.  Do  you  say  '  Yes  ?  '  " 

"  Yes." 

"Agreed!  And  now  we  will  never  speak 
of  these  things  again.  Good  night,  Claude ;  be 
happy,  old  boy,  and — and — don't  think  that 
I  am  not  so  tool  " 

Stanley  Villars  did  not  see  his  sister  Florence 
that  night,  though  he  went   to   his  mother's 
house,  scandalising  her  orderly  domestics  by 
arriving  at  such  an  unholy    hour,    and   slept 
through  what  was  left  of  it.     When  he  came 
down  the  following  morning,    Florence  came 
to  meet  him   as   soon  as  he  opened  the  door ;  j 
and  she  looked  so  brightly  beautiful,    so  hap-  j 
py  and  blooming,  that    it  almost  jarred  upon  ! 
him 


"  Dear  Stanley,  why  didn't  you  let  us  know 
you  were  coming  ?  "  Florence  asked. 

"  I  dare  say  Bella  knew,"  Lady  Villars  said, 
getting  up  to  give  her  son  a  warmer  welcome. 

"No,  she  didn't.  Where's  Georgie?"  he 
asked,  rather  absently.  He  wanted  to  tell  out 
the  truth  at  once  ;  he  wanted  them  all  to  hear 
it,  in  order  that  there  might  be  no  repetitions. 

"Georgie  is  staying  with  Gerald  and  his 
wife." 

"  In  Scotland,  are  they  not  ?  " 

"  Yes,  Mr.  planners  is  with  them.  They 
hope  that  Bella  and  you  will  go  to  them  when 
you  come  back  from  wherever  you're  going  on 
the  Continent.  When  is  it  to  be,  Stanley  ?  " 

"Never!"  Stanley  said.  "Don't  express 
surprise,  or  anything  else,  for  mercy's  sake, 
mother  I " 

Lady  Villars  controlled  all  expression,  not 
alone  of  surprise,  but  of  the  horrible  disappoint- 
ment she  felt  at  this  downfall  of  her  son's  pros- 
pects. She  had  sincerely  rejoiced  in  the  con- 
templated alliance,  for  Stanley  was  her  pet  son ; 
and,  alas !  he  was  the  younger  one. 

"Broken  off,"  she  faintly  articulated  at  last ; 
"  my  poor  boy!  my  poor,  dear  boy  !" 

"How,  Stanley?  why?"  Florence  asked, 
going  up  and  clasping  her  arms  over  his  shoul- 
der, and  leaning  her  head  down  upon  his  chest. 
"  You  haven't  quarrelled — she  loves  you  so ! 
Can't  it  be  made  up  ?" 

"Don't  be  a  little  fool,"  he  replied,  almost 
roughly ;  "  it's  all  over,  I  tell  you.  Love  me ! 
that's  absurd  now.  She  is  going  to  marry 
Claude  Walsingham!" 

This  was  the  moment  when  that  other  misery, 
to  which  I  have  alluded  in  a  former  chapter, 
was  laid  bare  to  him.  As  he  spoke  in  those 
rough  accents,  and  accents  that  it  went  against 
his  heart  then,  even  in  the  midst  of  his  own 
anguish,  to  use  to  Florence,  she  shrank  away 
from  him  with  a  cry  of  "No!  no!  no!"  and  a 
shiver  that  seemed  to  wither,  as  it  passed  over 
her  frame. 

"  My  God  !  my  poor  darling  1  there's  not  this 
in  addition  to  my  own  wretchedness  ?"  he  cried, 
taking  her  in  his  arms  again.  "He  has  not 
been  a  scoundrel  to  us  loth  f  he  interrogated, 
as  his  mother  came  up  and  kissed  Florence  on 
her  now  flame-coloured  forehead,  and  sighed 
that  "  she  had  feared  it  all  along ;  that  she  had 
always  distrusted  Major  Walsingham,  and  en- 
joined caution  on  Florence." 

"  How  should  caution  have  availed  her  when 
he  made  her  love  him,  as,  to  my  cost,  I  know 
he  can  make  a  woman  love  ?"  Stanley  said  in 
answer.  Then  Florence  shuddered  and  drew 
away  from  him,  and  played  a  portion  of  that 
little  mock  heroic  part  which  custom  commands 
that  women  shall  play  on  such  occasions. 

"  I  was  only  the  more  sorry  and  surprised 
because  it  was  Claude,"  she  said,  with  a  gulp 
over  his  name.  "  It  wasn't  for  myself,  Stanley. 
Don't  think  anything ;  don't  I  don't !  Promise 
you  won't!" 

"The  other  I  might  have  forgiven,  but  not 
this  double  treachery,"  he  replied. 

"There  has  been  no  treachery,"  Florence 
said,  trying  to  speak  firmly  in  order  to  carrjr 
conviction  to  her  brother's  heart. 

"  It  is  a  folly  that  you  will  soon — that  you1 
must  soon  conquer,  dear,"  her  mother  interpoa- 


ON  GUARD. 


57 


ed.  Lady  Villars  was  a  loving  parent,  tender 
and  considerate  to  her  children.  But  for  all  that 
tenderness  and  consideration,  she  could  not 
suffer  Florence  to  be  encouraged  to  destroy  her 
earliest  bloom,  and  so  injure  her  prospects,  by 
weeping  over  the  defalcation  of  one  who, 
whether  he  had  loved  or  not,  had  undoubtedly 
ridden  away. 

It  was  almost  as  if  there  had  been  a  death  in 
the  house  that  day.  The  usual  order  of  things 
was  rudely  interrupted.  There  was  no  future 
sister-in-law  sending  round  an  intimation  of  her 
intention  to  call  Florence  for  a  drive,  as  had  been 
the  custom  lately.  There  was  no  Claude  to  be 
hoped  for  all  the  morning,  and  found  at  the 
luncheon  table.  Lady  Villars,  feeling  that  she 
could  not  assuage  the  sorrow  which  had  come 
upon  her  children,  retired  to  her  own  room  and 
wrote  a  long  account,  or,  rather,  many  pages 
of  conjectures,  as  to  the  real  cause  of  Bella 
Vane's  change  of  faith,  to  her  eldest  son,  Sir 
Gerald.  It  was  a  bitter  grief  to  her  that  the 
girl  whose  money  would  have  placed  Stanley 
so  well,  whether  he  clung  to  his  profession  or 
not,  should  have  turned  round  at  the  last  and 
bestowed  it  on  the  man  whose  dallying  around 
Florence  had  been  for  many  months  a  source  of 
annoyance  to  her.  But  though  she  lamented  on 
Stanley's  account,  and  censured  Bella  with  a 
warm  censure  in  which  there  was  no  toleration, 
she  refrained  from  saying  a  word  about  either 
Claude  or  Florence.  The  mother  remembered 
that  her  eldest  son  was  a  married  man,  and 
that  young  Lady  Villars  was  one  who  would 
not  suffer  a  telling  story  to  die  out  for  want  of 
t  frequent  repetition,  even  were  it  against  her 
nearest.  All  she  said  about  her  daughter, 
therefore,  was — "Florry  feels  this  dreadfully, 
knowing  (as  I  do  also)  that  Stanley  will  never 
make  another  scheme  of  happiness.  Miss  Vane 
has  wronged  us  all'  cruelly  by  being  so  falsely 
fond.  He  will  never  forget  it ;  and  while  he 
remembers,  his  life  will  be  barren." 

For  many  hours  after  that  disclosure  Florence 
strove  to  avoid  her  mother,  her  brother,  even 
the  light  of  day.  A  sort  of  ague,  that  increased 
directly  it  was  looked  upon,  seized  her ;  and  so 
ghe  crept  away  to  a  corner  of  her  bedroom,  be- 
tween the  wall  and  the  heavy  masses  of  curtain 
that  fell  from  a  ring  in  the  ceiling  over  her  bed, 
the  shade  of  which  partially  concealed  her.  She 
had  neither  been  fickle,  heartless,  unstable,  nor 
false.  But  she  suffered  as  much  pain  and  as 
much  shame  as  though  she  had  been  all  these 
things.  "When  she  thought  of  Claude  she  could 
scarcely  lift  her  eyes  from  the  ground.  He  had 
been  the  deceiver,  but  it  was  the  deceived  that 
was  abashed,  and  suffered  bitter  woe  at  the 
memory  of  the  deception. 

Superadded  to  her  own  sorrow  at  losing  the 
hope  that  the  love  which  she  thought  a  more 
glorious  thing  than  God's  sun  would  eventually 
be  pledged  openly,  as  it  had  been  persistently 
proffered  to  her  mutely  for  long,  was  the  heart- 
ache she  had  for  her  brother.  Hard  as  her  own 
case  was,  his  she  felt  to  be  an  infinitely  harder 
one.  He  was  deceived  by  both  friend  and  love ; 
she  by  her  heart  alone  1 

So  she  told  herself;  for  even  to  herself  she 
would  strive  to  vindicate  Claude ;  even  to  her 
own  heart  she  told  the  white  lie  that  removed 
the  semblance  of  dishonourable  dealing  from 


him.  He  had  been  kind,  gentle,  and  loving  to 
her  in  what  she  ought  to  have  felt  to  be  what 
it  was,  a  brotherly  way  only.  As  she  thought 
of  some  of  his  brotherly  kindnesses  she  would 
break  down  for  a  minute  or  two  with  the  sick- 
ening consciousness  that  they  had  clouded  her 
life  in  a  way  brotherly  kindnesses  should  never 
have  done ;  and  then  she  would  battle  with 
the  external  display  of  emotion  and  do  away 
with  the  signs  of  it,  remembering  that  she 
must  see  Stanley  again  at  luncheon,  when  every 
tear-stain  on  her  face  would  recall  to  him  that 
which  it  behoved  her  to  try  and  teach  him  to 
forget. 

She  was  very  loyal  to  her  brother,  but  she 
was  loyal  to  her  woman's  nature  too.  She 
wished  to  think  of  Stanley  only,  but  some  su- 
perior behest — whether  God-given  or  not,  who 
shall  say  ? — made  her  think  almost  entirely  of 
Claude. 

She  hardly  dared  to  raise  .her  eyes  to  Stan- 
ley's face  when  she  found  herself  seated  oppo- 
site to  him  again.  She  dreaded  what  she  might 
see  there.  It  seemed  to  her  a  sort  of  treason 
to  be  observant  of  aught  that  Stanley  himself 
could  wish  unseen.  When  she  did  at  last,  in 
answer  to  some  question  he  addressed  to  her, 
raise  her  eyes  to  his  and  nod  assent,  she  found 
that  he  was  looking  at  her  very  steadily,  as 
though  he  desired  to  read  all  that  she  desired  to 
conceal. 

"  You  have  been  having  a  hard  time  of  it 
this  morning,  Florry,"  he  said  compassionately ; 
"  don't  try  to  tell  me  no,  little  one!"  he  added, 
hastily  rising  up  and  going  round  to  her  and 
clasping  her  to  his  heart,  as  a  man  would  clasp 
the  one  thing  he  felt  to  be  true  to  him  when  the 
one  to  whom  he  was  most  true  had  given  that 
heart  a  deadening  blow. 

"  I  am  so  foolish,"  she  murmured ;  "  only  for 
you  though,  dear  I  only  for  you  I" 

He  tried  to  believe  her,  for  he  desired  to  be- 
lieve her.  If  he  did  not  credit  this  statement 
of  herSj  he  could  not  ask  her  to  do  something 
for  him  which  he  wanted  done.  He  was  not 
that  exceptional  thing,  an  entirely  unselfish 
man,  therefore  he  strove  to  credit  his  sister's 
statement  of  her  sorrow  being  for  him  alone. 

"  Will  you  do  something  that  I  would  not 
ask  another  woman  in  the  world  to  do  for  me, 
Florry ;  that  no  other  woman,  save  my  sister 
Florry;  would  be  noble  enough  to  do  ?" 

"Yes,  anything." 

The  love  that  not  even  perfidy  and  light  re- 
gard of  his  mighty  claims  on  her  could  quell 
welled  up  for  Bella  Vane  and  cast  out  his  con- 
sideration for  his  sister. 

"  Be  a  friend  to  Bella  should  she  ever  need 
you,  Florry.  Promise  me  that  you  will  not 
avoid  her  should  she  seek  you.  Promise  me 
that  you  will  never  let  her  guess  that  you  have 
cause  for  suffering  in  connection  with  her,  inde- 
pendent of  my  share  in  this  affair." 

"You  ask  me,  Stanley?  " 

"I  entreat  you  to  do  this." 

"  I  will,  dear.  But  how  should  she  want  me  ? 
Why  should  she  need  a  friend  ?  Why  should  I 
trouble  her,  even  ?  She  will  have  Claude  !  She 
will  be  so  happy  !  " 

Not  all  her  gentle  sweetness ;  not  all  her  love 
for  her  brother ;  not  all*  her  modest  doubt  of 
Claude's  ever  having  entertained  more  than  a 


53 


ON  GUARD. 


brotherly  fondness  for  her,  could  soften  or  sub- 
due the  sharp,  poignant,  bitter  ring  of  genuine 
jealousy  with  which  these  words  rang  out 
"She  will  have  Claude!  She  will  be  so 
happy  1  "  They  painted  vividly  a  whole  series 
of  pictures  of  Claude  and  Bella,  happy  and  to- 
gether, that  were  maddening  to  look  upon. 
They  brought  with  hideous  clearness  to  the 
inind  of  the  one  who  listened,  Bella's  caressing 
words  and  ways ;  and  to  the  one  who  spoke, 
Claude's  mighty  power  of  tenderness. 

"  She  will  have  Claude ;  but  make  her  happi- 
ness while  you  may,  for  it  will  not  last  long," 
he  said  at  last ;  and  Florry  sobbingly  rejoined, 
'•  I  promise ;  I  promise." 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

OVER   THE  PRECIPICE. 

IT  can  hardly  be  told  how  the  fair  and  perfect 
understanding  which  it  was  necessary  should 
subsist  came  about  between  Major  Walsingham 
and  Bella  Yane.  Their  first  meeting  after  that 
last  scene  with  Stanley  was  very  'awkward,  for 
not  even  to  woman  is  given  the  exquisite  tact 
to  utterly  ignore  all  that  has  been  held  most 
binding  and  most  holy,  in  an  instant.  The 
next  interview  was  less  embarrassing,  however ; 
and  the  next  (they  were  both  so  young,  and 
were  in  such  perfect  health — the  secret  of  more 
than  half  the  joyousness  of  the  world)  was  all 
that  could  be  desired  in  the  way  of  blest  obli- 
vion. 

Bella  stood  to  these  newly-cast  guns  of  hers 
stoutly  ;  and  she  had  some  need  for  the  display 
of  all  her  strength.  A  great  many  wearing 
obstacles  obtruded  themselves,  in  the  shape  of 
irrelevant  prayers  from  her  guardians,  and  a 
lot  of  people  who  were  loosely  connected  with 
her,  to  "  be  careful  this  time,  and  not  to  hastily 
rush  into  a  second  error." 

But  she  was  young,  and  her  health  wa*s  very 
perfect,  so  she  stood  to  her  guns  gallantly,  and 
never  fired  a  shot  hi  anger.  Indeed,  this  period 
may  be  judged  to  have  been  far  from  an  un- 
pleasant one,  for  Claude  was  so  devoted  to  her 
that  they  both  forgot  to  speak  of  or  to  seek 
Florry  Villars. 

Miss  Yane  decided,  on  very  good  solid 
grounds,  that  she  had  chosen  the  better  part, 
and  been  wise  in  throwing  over  the  old  love 
for  this  new  one,  who  never  dictated  to  her  in 
arbitrary  tones,  or  strove  to  rule  her  in  right 
lines  harshly.  She  contrasted  Claude's  non- 
exacting  spirit  with  Stanley's  slightly  domineer- 
ing one,  and  the  contrast  showed  Claude  off 
favourably.  She  began  to  bless  that  luckless 
ride  which  had  brought  Major  Walsingham  and 
herself  together  under  circumstances  that  had 
proved  so  eminently  conducive  to  feelings  that 
it  behooved  them  both  in  honour  to  have 
check.  She  sang  full  many  an  inward  jubilate 
over  that  morning  stroll  under  the  green  trees 
in  the  cathedral  close,  and  gave  the  feelings 
which  she  had  held  in  with  a  tight  hand  that 
day  full  play,  now  that  she  dared  to  do  so. 

It  was  a  glorious  time  of  triumph,  and  she 
thought  scarcely  at  all  of  Stanley,  and  never  at 
all  of  Florence  during  it.  But  they  thought  of 


her.  With  a  feverish,  incessant  pertinacity, 
that  would  not  be  quieted,  this  brother  and 
sister  had  the  memory  of  this  girl,  and  her 
pretty,  pettish  ways,  ever  before  them.  He, 
running  the  round  of  duties  down  at  Denham, 
that  had  become  not  alone  arduous,  but  odious 
to  him,  would  wonder  restlessly  when  he 
should  be  summoned  to  consummate  the  sacri- 
fice, and  mock  his  own  heart  by  repeating  the 
formula  that  he  had  once  held  holy ;  while 
Florence  strained  her  eyes  daily,  when  out  for 
a  drive  with  her  mother,  in  order  not  so  much 
that  she  might  see  them,  as  that  she  might  see 
to  avoid  them. 

Clearly  Bella  had  no  need  of  a  friend  as  yet. 
Florence  was  not  put  to  the  sore  test  by  which 
her  brother  had  desired  to  try  her.  The  girls 
had  been  very  friendly,  after  the  manner  of 
girls;  but  when,  in  October,  some  of  Claude's 
relations,  amongst  others  one  of  his  sisters, 
came  up,  and  asked  Bella,  "  How  did  she  and 
the  Yillars'  meet  ?  She  had  had  one  of  the  girls 
staying  with  her,  had  she  not?"  Bella  an- 
swered, with  .ever  so  little  of  a  blush,  and  with 
no  shadow  of  contrite  embarrassment — 

"  Oh,  yes !  but  that  was  long  ago.  We 
should  be  friendly  enough  if  we  met,  I  dare 
say,  but  we  never  do  meet.  I  wrote  to  her 
once  after  that  (you  know),  and  she  answered 
me  very  kindly.  Don't  speak  about  it  before 
Claude,  for  he  doesn't  like  it !" 

This  reputed  prejudice  of  Claude's  was  re- 
spected to  the  letter  by  his  own  family ;  they 
none  of  them  offended  him  by  the  most  distant 
allusion  to  his  predecessor  in  the  heart  of  Miss 
Yane.  He  marked  their  reticence,  and,  half 
fancying  that  it  sprang  from  some  doubt  of  the 
prudence  of  his  choice,  he  resented  it  by  still 
greater  reserve,  which  reacted  upon  them,  ren- 
dering them  more  reticent  still. 

Bella  herself  would  talk  cheerily  enough  to 
him  about  Stanley.  "He  was  too  good  and 
too  hard  for  me.  I  never  loved  him  really, 
I'm  ashamed  to  say.  What  carried  me  away 
to  the  point  of  such,  forgetfulness  of  what  I 
knew  my  needs  to  bo,  as  to  engage  myself  to 
him,  I  can't  think.  I  wanted  'warmth  and 
colour,'  like  Queen  GuineTre,  and  that  I  found 
in  you,  Claude." 

"If  I  have  been  Launcelot  to  you  hitherto,  I 
warn  you  I  shall  be  Arthur  henceforth,"  he 
said;  and  Bella  replied,  "Oh,  yes!  Arthur, 
without  the  unpleasantness." 

It  was  not  wholly  disagreeable  to  Claude  to 
hear  that  Stanley  Yillars  had  ever  been  cold  and 
hard  to  Bella,  even  while  betrothed  to  her.  He 
did  not  entirely  believe  it,  but  still  the  hearing 
it  was  pleasanter  than  the  hearing  records  of 
impassioned  sympathy  would  have  been.  That 
Stanley  had  had  hot  love  in  his  heart  for  Bella 
he  felt  firmly  convinced.  He  also  felt  firmly 
convinced  that  Stanley  had  never  suffered  the 
utmost  fervour  of  that  heat  to  betray  itself  to 
her,  for  Bella  sagaciously  kept  the  story  of 
that  last  meeting  and  parting  embrace  to  her- 
self. 

It  was  in  the  last  ruddy  October  days  that 
the  marriage  was  to  take  place,  and  a  brief  no- 
tice of  this  fact  was  forwarded  to  Stanley,  ac- 
cording to  promise,  by  the  happy  expectant 
bridegroom.  The  answer  to  this  notice  assured 
Claude  that  he  (Mr.  Yillars)  would  be  there  at 


ON  GUARD. 


the  time  appointed.  After  it  came  they  forgot, 
or  seemed  to  forget  him  again. 

Comparatively  speaking,  it  was  to  be  a  very 
quiet  wedding.  They  had  erected  this  new 
fabric  too  quickly  on  the  ashes  of  the  old  for  it 
to  seem  well  to  those  who  had  the  organisation 
of  it  to  bid  many  to  the  opening  spectacle.  But, 
quiet  as  they  determined  that  the  wedding 
should  be,  and  few  as  were  the  guests  whom 
they  cared  to  assemble,  it  gave  them  a  power 
of  trouble. 

In  the  first  place  Mrs.  Yane,  Bella's  indolent 
mamma,  unexpectedly  roused  herself,  and  de- 
clared that  it  would  be  an  indecent  exhibition 
of  carelessness  of  what  had  gone  before  to  allow 
Stanley  Villars  to  perform  the  ceremony.  It 
was  in  vain  that  Bella  avowed  that  it  was  "  nice 
and  natural  of  Stanley  to  wish  to  do  it,  since  he 
desired  to  be  friendly  with  Claude  and  herself." 
Mrs.  Vane  could  not  deny  her  natural  maternal 
instincts.  She  doubted  the  desire  for  future  in- 
tercourse of  a  merely  friendly  order,  and  re- 
membered that  embrace  which  she  had  wit- 
nessed that  day  when  the  final  blow  was  struck 
at  the  last  contemplated  alliance. 

"  You  must  argue  the  question  with  Claude, 
mamma,"  Bella  said,  at  last;  "he  agreed  to 
Stanley's  request.  That  being  the  case,  I  do 
feel  that  no  one  else  has  any  excuse  for  saying 
a  word  against  it." 

Even  to  this  extent — the  extent  of  arguing 
with  Claude — did  Mrs.  Yane  go,  in  her  desire 
to  avert  this  thing,  from  which  she  felt  no  good 
could  accrue. 

"  It  will  be  a  needless  trial  to  all  your  feel- 
ings," she  urged,  and  Claude  answered — 

"No  trial  to  mine;  and. if  Stanley's  half  as 
sensible  as  I  take  him  to  be,  none  to  his  either, 
after  this  lapse  of  time.  At  any  rate,  my  dear 
madam,  if  we  are  to-be  had  up  at  all,  like  crimi- 
nals at  the  bar,  before  the  altar,  for  a  mob  to 
stare  at,  it  must  be  under  Stanley's  auspices. 
I'd  prefer  going  through  some  simpler  ceremony 
— say  jumping  over  a  broomstick,  or  going  to  a 
registrar's  office ;  but  perhaps  you  would  hardly 
feel  satisfied  about  your  daughter." 

On  hearing  which,  Mrs.  Yane  lifted  up  the 
hands  of  her  soul  in  dumb  amaze,  and  said  no 
further  words  that  were  antagonistic  to  that 
plan  regarding  Stanley  Yillars. 

After  this  a  second  and  a  mightier  annoyance 
arose.  It  has  been  seen  that  some  of  Major 
Walsin£ ham's  relations  had  come  up  and 'made 
the  acquaintance  of  the  bride.  But  they  were 
minor  relations — sisters  and  younger  brothers, 
and"  such  small  deer.  Claude  wanted  his  pa- 
rents to  come  up  and  do  honour  to  the  alliance, 
and  the  woman  with  whom  he  was  going  to 
make  it.  He  had  asked  both  his  father  and 
mother  to  come,  but  he  had  been  especially 
urgent  that  his  mother  should  do  so,  and  his 
mother  steadfastly  declined  to  pleasure  him  in 
this.  She  would  not  come.  Worse  than  this, 
she  wrote  him  four  pages  of  reasons  why  she 
would  not  do  so,  and  none  of  these  reasons 
were  soothing  to  him.  She  was  ill  pleased  at 
his  choice :  a  heart  so  lightly  won  and  lightly 
lost,  as  she  affected  to  believe  Miss  Yane's  must 
have  been,  was  not  the  heart  that  should  have 
beaten  within  the  breast  of  the  wife  of  the  hope 
of  her  house.  She  distrusted  Miss  Yane  ;  she 
disliked  that  complete  abnegation  of  all  the  old 


ties  of  friendship  with  her  late  lover's  family,  of 
which  report  said  Miss  Yane  was  now  guilty. 
All  this  she  said  in  so  many  straightforward 
words  to  her  son,  and  the  reading  it  was  dis- 
turbing. 

"It's  devilish  hard  that  because  a  girl  can't 
control  her  affections  she  is  to  be  regarded  in 
this  way!  "  Claude  said  to  his  sister,  who  had 
received  a  corresponding  letter.  "  Bella  is  im- 
pressionable— a  grave  offence  in  my  mother's 
eyes.  I  shall  never  take  her  down  there." 

"  Oh  yes,  you  will ! — take  her  down  and  all 
will  be  well.  Mamma  is  a  little  rigid,  perhaps ; 
but  it'  all  comes  of  her  anxiety  for  your  happi- 
ness, Claude." 

"  Bella  will  be  awfully  hurt  at  this  definite 
refusal  to  come  to  our  marriage,"  he  said,  rather 
sadly.  "I  thought  my  mother  would  have 
done  me  so  much  grace  as  that." 

However,  when  he  told  Bella  that  his 
"  mother  found  she  could  not  come,"  he  was 
surprised  (he  scarcely  knew  himself  whether 
agreeably  or  not)  to  find  that  Miss  Yane  was 
most  unfeignedly  indifferent  about  it.  "Oh! 
can't  she,  Claude  ?  Let  me  see,  that's  one — 
two,  indeed,  for  we  counted  your  father— off 
the  list,  for  sure !  " 

When  her  marriage  morning  came  Miss  Yane 
neither  was,  nor  did  she  feign  to  be  indifferent. 
She  was  as  nervous,  despite  her  experiences,  as 
an  author  over  a  first  review.  She  could  but 
remember  vividly — she  could  but  feel  conscious 
that  others  were  remembering  vividly — the 
widely  different  conditions  under  which,  but 
the  other  day,  she  had  thought  to  stand  at  the 
altar  with  Stanley  Yillars.  For  the  first  time 
she  felt  that  her  mother's  objections  to  him  as 
the  uniting  medium  were  good,  valid,  and* 
reasonable.  For  the  first  time  it  struck  her 
that  Claude  had  been  wanting  in  delicacy  of 
feeling  in  acceding  to  a  request  that  had  been 
made  under  most  disordering  circumstances. 
It  was  all  too  late  to  alter  things,  however,  so 
she  kept  her  just  awakened  scruples  to  herself, 
and  resolved  to  go  through  it  all,  as  though  it 
all  seemed  fair  and  smooth  to  her,  as  it  did  to 
the  majority  of  the  idle,  unenlightened  lookers- 
on. 

But  it  was  far  from  being  fair  and  smooth  to 
her.  It  was  an  awful  ordeal  *to  stand  there, 
and  hear  the  words  that  were  binding  her  to 
another  uttered  by  the  man  who  had  avowed 
the  hottest  passion  for  her  when  last  they  met. 
It  was  hard  to  know  what  he  felt  for  her,  and 
then  to  hear  him  asking  her  to  vow,  before 
God,  to  love,  honour,  and  obey  the  one  who 
had  wrested  her  from  him.  It  was  hard  to 
have  him  taking  her  hand  and  Claude's  toge- 
ther !  Thoughtless  as  she  was,  there  was  not 
one  touch  of  baseness  in  her  nature — her  whole 
soul  revolted  at  this.  But  harder  than  all  else 
was  it  to  hear  him  utter  the  final  blessing,  in 
tones  that  told  her  fully  that  he  felt  how  idle 
the  words  Were— how  weak,  after  all  that  had 
gone  before. 

He  meanwhile  found  himself  marvelling, 
with  a  strange  composure,  whether  custom  had 
so  monstrously  distorted  her  naturally  bright 
understanding  as  to  render  her  oblivious  of  the 
ghastly  incongruity  which  was  the  distinguish- 
ing characteristic  of  the  occasion.  In  his  pre- 
sence could  she  possibly  forget  that  at  "  the 


60 


ON  GUARD. 


dreadful  day  of  judgment,  when  the  secrets  of 
all  hearts  shall  be  disclosed,"  an  "impediment" 
to  so  brisk  an  alteration  as  she  had  made  in  her 
scheme  of  life,  should  have  to  be  confessed? 
Or  had  she  thrown  the  pieces  of  the  broken 
troth  aside,  as  we  do  a  shattered  vase  or  a  frac- 
tured glove,  either  of  which  may  be  replaced 
at  our  earliest  opportunity  ? 

He  decided  in  favour  of  deeming  her  guilty 
of  the  utter  oblivion.  Because  she,  remembering 
all  too  well  as  she  did,  dared  not  permit  herself 
to  show  that  she  remembered  aught,  he  fancied 
her  to  be  just  thus  much  more  thoughtless  and 
careless  than  she  was.  A  woman  must  always 
be  misjudged  in  such  a  case  as  this:  she  is 
arraigned  at  the  bar  of  individual  opinion,  and 
common  prudence  forbids  that  she  shall  attempt 
to  offer  evidence  in  her  own  defence  to  that 
special  person. 

It  was  over  at  last !  The  priest,  the  bride- 
groom, and  the  rest  of  the  nobler  sex  stalked 
as  majestically  as  the  nineteenth  century  garb 
and  circumstances  would  allow,  and  the  bride 
and  bridesmaids  billowed  like  surging  waves 
of  tulle;  into  the  vestry,  where  as  many  as 
were  requested  to  do  so,  signed  a  something, 
and  all  wished  the  happy  pair  long  life  and 
happiness,  hysterically.  Then  the  church  was 
cleared  of  the  curious  crowd,  and  the  clergy- 
man who  had  officiated  of  his  canonical  cos- 
tume, and  it  was  all  over,  all  over ! 

Stanley  Yillars  did  not  intend,  nor  was  he 
pressed  to  go  back  to  the  nest  from  which  the 
bird  had  winged  her  flight,  and  eat,  and  drink, 
and  be  merry.  The  man  who  had  won  and 
the  man  who  had  lost  said  their  final  say  to 
each  other,  while  the  bride  was  drawing  on  her 
gloves  (and  trying  not  to  look  at  them),  after 
signing  her  maiden  name  for  the  last  time. 
Major  Walsingham  put  his  hand  out  with  a 
half  uncertain  air  to  his  old  ally,  and  asked, 
"  It  is  all  well  with  us,  Stanley  ?  We  shall  see 
you  when  we  come  back  ?" 

"  It  is  all  well  with  us,  but  you  won't  see  me 
till  one  of  you  need  me,  sorely  enough  to  make 
me  forget,  which,  God  knows,  I  trust  may  be 
never!" 

"It's  been  devilish  hard  on  both  of  us,  old 
boy,"  the  other  replied  in  rather  a  shaken  tone, 
'"  but  the  worst  is  over  now." 

"  Yes,  there  can  be  nothing  beyond  it  in 
point  of  pain ;  but  it's  over  now,  as  you  say." 

Major  "Walsingham  turned  to  his  wife  as  his 
old  friend  said  this,  and  drew  her  by  the  hand 
towards  them. 

"  Can  you  tell  him,  Bella,  how  warmly  we 
shall  always  regard  him — how  cut  to  the  quick 
we  shall  be  if  he  can't  come  to  us  ?" 

"  That  I  can,"  she  said  frankly.  "  Good  bye, 
dear  Stanley,"  she  added  suddenly,  with  evi- 
dent symptoms  of  breaking  down,  and  a  com- 
plete confession  in  her  eyes  of  inability  to  say 
that  which  she  had  but  the  instant  before 
avowed  her  perfect  readiness  (to  utter.  Then 
the  newly-made  husband  and  wife  turned 
away,  and  when  Stanley  Villars  raised  his 
eyes  (he  had  dropped  them  when  the  confes- 
sion gleamed  from  hers)  he  was  almost  alone, 
and  the  shouts  of  the  crowd  outside  told  him 
that  the  bridal  pair  were  starting  on  the  jour- 
ney of  life. 


CHAPTER  XX. 

"MY  WIFE." 

THE  first  stage  m  the  journey  was  over.  They 
whom  we  saw  last  in  the  act  of  starting  upon 
it  had  been  man  and  wife  for  some  months  now 
when  we  are  about  to  run  up  the  curtain,  and 
call  them  forward  to  the  front  of  the  stage 
again.  II  was  in  the  ruddy,  mellow,  latest  Oc- 
tober days  that  they  vanished ;  the  season  of 
their  re-appearance  is  bright,  clear  January 
weather. 

Major  and  Mrs.  "Walsingham  had  every  rea- 
son to  suppose  that  they  had  executed  a  grand 
success  in  thus  joining  forces  for  the  purpose  of 
together  fighting  the  battle  of  life.  They  had 
been  excellent  travelling  companions.  Every- 
thing had  gone  smoothly  with  them  :  none  of 
the  wilfulness  of  old  days  had  cropped  up  in 
Bella,  She,  with  her  bright,  high  spirit,  was 
as  easy  to  manage — Claude  told  himself — as  the 
meekest  woman  would  have  been.  Her  will 
never  ran  counter  to  his,  though  she  was  as  far 
removed  from  being  a  slave  wife  as  the  north 
pole  is  from  the  south.  True,  he  had  never 
"  pulled  against  her  "  yet ;  but  up  to  the  pre- 
sent time  a  hair-rein  and  a  finger  were  all  suffi- 
cient to  guide  her. 

Major  Walsingham  had  long  since  forgiven 
his  mother  for  disregarding  his  warmly  ex- 
pressed wishes,  and  refusing  to  come  to  his 
wedding.  He  had  gone  on  excusing  her  so 
assiduously  to  Bella  (not  that  Bella  seemed  to 
think  excuses  needed),  that  at  last  he  fully  ex- 
cused her  to  his  own  heart.  He  was  not  unna- 
turally desirous  of  showing  his  wife  to  her — 
his  wife  whom  he  firmly  believed  to  be  as 
"  game  as  she  was  mild,  and  as  mild  as  she  was 
game."  His  mother's  quick  appreciation  would 
speedily  show  her  that  Bella  would  never  mar 
the  breed. 

This  being  the  case,  he  felt  a  little  disap- 
pointed when  Bella  received  the  news  of  an 
invitation  to  spend  Christmas  with  them  at  the 
Court,  his  father's  place,  with  a  blank  look.  It 
might  be  that  she  "  was  a  little  tired  though," 
he  said  to  himself,  for  it  was  the  night  of  their 
return  to  town  from  their  tour.  Invitations  to 
be  off  and  doing  again  immediately  do  not  fall 
refreshingly  on  the  ear  when  one  has  just  come 
off  a  long  journey. 

"  I  thought  you  would  like  to  go,"  he  said. 
"  However,  we  will  speak  about  it  to-morrow." 

"  Go ! — of  course  I  shall  like  to  go  above  all 
things,  Claude.  I  have  been  looking  forward 
to  going  there  in  March." 

"  Why  more  in  March  than  now  ?  What  has 
March  done  to  be  specially  selected  for  the 
honour  ? " 

"Why,  this  is  the  twenty-third,  you  see, 
Claude.  If  we  go  down  to-morrow,  I  shall 
absolutely  not  have  a  moment  to  spare  for  any- 
thing, and  I  have  so  many  things  to  do." 

"  Do  them  when  you  come  back." 

"  Of  course  I  shall,  if  you  make— if  you  wish 
me  to  start  off  at  once,"  she  replied. 

She  was  bearing  on  the  bit,  but  very  lightly 
— only  just  so  much  as  a  well-mettled  one 
would  do  when  taken  unexpectedly  over  a  little 
bit  of  rough  ground. 

"  Well,  we  will  speak  about  it  to-morrow," 


ON  GUARD. 


61 


Major  "Walsingbam  said  once  more,  after  looking 
at  her  for  an  instant  or  two  in  silence. 

"  Perhaps  it  would  be  better  to  settle  it  to- 
night, dear,"  she  rejoined,  brightly.  "  If  we  do 
go,  I  must  sit  up  and  write  notes  to  divers 
people  whom  I  have  promised  to  see  to-morrow ; 
if  we  are  not  to  go,  I  will  be  off  to  rest  my 
weary  head  at  once." 

Her  weary  head  looked  uncommonly  grace- 
ful and  pretty  as  she  spoke.  He  saw  that 
she  was  trying  to  have  her  own  way  in  this 
matter;  but  she  was  trying  for  it  so  good- 
humouredly,  so  gracefully,  that  he  determined 
to  give  way — the  more  especially  as  a  country 
Christmas  did  not  recommend  itself  at  all  too 
warmly  to  his  sympathies. 

"Then  I  will  settle  that  we  go  down  in 
March,"  he  said,  laughing ;  on  which  Bella 
got  up  and  danced  across  the  room  to  him,  and 
kissed  him.  ' 

"  You  darling  boy !  I  would  do  anything  in 
the  world  to  please  you," she  said;  "but  I  am 
tired,  and  writing  notes  to-night  would  have 
been  rather  hard  work." 

So  it  came  to  pass  that  it  was  not  until  the 
bright,  clear  March  weather  had  set  in  that  the 
eldest  son  of  the  house  and  his  bride  made 
their  appearance  at  the  Court.  The  whole 
family  were  then  assembled  there ;  the  married 
sisters  and  their  husbands,  and  the  younger  bro- 
thers and  the  distant  relatives,  who  remem- 
bered the  ties  of  affinity  annually,  had  not 
departed  when  Major  and  Mrs.  Claude  Walsing- 
ham  arrived.  There  were  just  precisely  the 
same  elements  of  agreeability  present  at  the 
Court  now  as  there  had  been  present  during  the 
Christmas  week.  But  Mrs.  Walsingham  could 
not  quite  forgive  her  daughter-in-law  for  not 
having  clutched  at  the  olive-branch  imme- 
diately it  had  been,  extended.  Therefore,  she 
elected  to  believe  that  "  things  would  have 
been  pleasanter  if  they  had  come  at  Christmas," 
and  to  assert  the  same,  not  alone  in  so  many 
words,  but  in  her  manner  also.  The  most  deli- 
cate bloom,  in  fact,  was  brushed  off  the  welcome, 
in  consequence  of  the  delay  they  had  made  in 
coming. 

Mrs.  Claude  was  very  happy,  notwithstand- 
ing this.  Claude  had  brought  down  his  horses, 
and  the  lamented  Vengeance  had  such  a  suc- 
cessor that  Mrs.  Claude  marvelled  much  at  her- 
self for  ever  having  been  satisfied  with  that 
once  prized  mare.  During  the  time  they  had 
been  in  London,  Bella  and  her  new  horse  had 
grown  well  accustomed  to  each  other,  though 
their  only  field  for  the  cultivation  of  this  un- 
derstanding had  been  Rotten  Row.  She  had 
found  him  free,  light  in  hand,  and  though  not 
a  "grand,"  a  remarkably  swift  and  elegant 
goer.  His  temper,  too,  appeared  as  perfect  as 
was  desirable,  and  Claude  declared  him  to  be 
as  safe  and  strong  as  a  woman's  horse  should 
be. 

But  he  had  been  found  by  his  mistress  to  be 
worthy  of  a  superior  sphere  of  action  than  the 
Row,  therefore  he  had  come  down  with 
Claude's  greys,  for  the  purpose  of  being  tried 
over  the  neighbouring  country,  when  the 
hounds  met  near  the  Court.  This,  at  least,  was 
Bella's  intention,  and  as  yet  Claude  had  said 
nothing  antagonistic  to  it. 

Major  and  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  arrived 


at  an  inauspicious  hour  at  the  family  mansion. 
There  was  a  minute  railway-station  for  the 
accommodation  of  the  Court,  just  half  a  mile 
from  the  park  gates.  But  Claude  happened  to 
be  asleep  when  the  train  stopped  there,  and 
Bella  did  not  clearly  comprehend  what  the 
guard  was  talking  about,  as  he  ran  along  the 
platform,  asking,  "  Any  passengers  for  tho 
Court?"  Consequently  they  were  carried  on 
five  miles  further,  and  then  had  to  drive  over 
in  their  own  open  trap,  instead  of  going  up 
comfortably  in  admirable  time  to  dress  for  din- 
ner, in  the  Court  carriage.  This  little  oversight 
caused-  them  to  be  late  for  dinner ;  there  was 
gloom  in  the  family  mansion  when  they  ar- 
rived. 

Gloom  that  Bella's  bright  presence  almost 
dispelled.  "  How  many  of  you  do  I  know  ?" 
she  said,  throwing  off  some  of  her  wraps,  as 
her  husband  hurriedly  led  her  into  the  draw- 
ing-room, where  a  powerful  party  awaited  her. 
Then  giving  a  hand  on  each  side  to  as  many 
brothers  and  sisters  as  came  across  her  in  her 
progress,  she  made  a  swift  descent  upon  Mrs. 
Walsingham,  and  held  up  her  cheek  to  be 
kissed  by  that  stately  lady,  to  whom  she  took 
an  immediate  liking,  because,  as  she  said  after- 
wards, "  She  was  like  Claude,  in  a  bad  temper 
and  a  cap." 

Old  Mrs.  Walsingham  was  very  tall  and  very 
stately,  oppressively  so  until  you  got  used  to 
her.  She  had  married  when  she  was  very 
young,  and  nearly  the  whole  of  her  life  had 
been  spent  at  the  Court.  It  was  small  wonder, 
therefore,  that  she  should  deem  the  majority  of 
things  that  were  not  done  by  herself,  or  some 
other  denizen  of  the  Court,  wrong.  She  had 
never  been  guilty  of  jilting  a  man,  nor  had  she 
ever  missed  the  Court  railway  platform.  Bella 
had  done  both  these  things,  and  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham remembered  them  against  her,  even  as  she 
came  up  blithely,  and  held  up  her  cheek  to  be 
kissed. 

But  the  offender  was  Claude's  wife,  that  the 
mother  "could  never  forget,"  she  told  herself, 
even  as  the  memory  of  those  other  things 
rankled.  So  the  kiss  that  was  expected  was 
given,  and  given  not  unkindly. 

"  Claude  is  leaving  me  to  introduce  you  to 
his  father,  my  dear,"  she  said,  taking  Bella's 
hand,  and  turning  her  round  to  where  a  hand- 
some old  gentleman,  who  looked  like  a  king 
with  no  thorns  in  his  crown,  stood  shaking 
hands  with  his  son.  u  Having  done  which," 
Mrs.  Walsingham  continued,  as  the  father 
stooped  down  with  real  old  chivalresque  courte- 
sy to  salute  the  young  wife,  "I  will  suggest 
that  you  go  to  your  room  and  prepare  for  din- 
ner." 

Mrs.  Walsingham  made  the  suggestion  as 
another  woman  would  have  uttered  words  of 
the  most  authoritative  command.  Mrs.  Claude 
glanced  at  her  mother-in-law  with  a  glance  that 
looked  half  careless,  but  that  was  -in  reality 
very  keen,  and  she  saw  breakers  a-head. 

"  Will  you  ever  forgive  us  for  being  so  awk- 
ward as  to  make  this  mistake  on  our  first  visit, 
Mr.  Walsingham?"  the  new  daughter-in-law 
asked,  suddenly  turning  to  her  host.  She  lifted 
her  hat,  a  fast-looking  turban  hat,  with  a  ptar- 
migan's wing  in  it,  from  her  head,  as  she  spoke, 
and  stood  revealed  before  them  all,  bright  in 


ON  GUARD. 


such  beauty  as  might  have  been  held  to  excuse 
worse  things  than  she  had  ever  done. 

"  I  think  I  could  forgive  you  anything,  my 
dear."  The  words  were  very  simple;  he  could 
hardly  have  said  less  under  the  circumstances, 
X)ut  his  manner  pleased  both  his  son  and  his 
son's  bride.  He  lifted  her  little  hand  up  as 
though  it  had  been  the  hand  of  a  queen,  and 
pressed  his  lips  upon  it  as  a  father  should  on 
the  hand,  of  his  child.  Bella  was  quite  satis- 
fied. One  at  least  in  this  house,  and  that  one 
the  head  of  it,  was  not  slow  to  recognise  her 
claim  to  universal  consideration  and  admira- 
tion. 

"  Then  forgive  me  when  I  say  that  I  would 
rather  stay  here  and  thaw  over  this  big  fire, 
than  detain  you  all  while  I  dressed  for  dinner. 
Do  let  me  stay  ?" 

Claude  saw  his  mother's  lips  form  the  word 
"whims,"  and  on  the  instant  he  ranged  him- 
self on  the  side  of  his  wife. 

"It  would  be  odd  if  you  couldn't  please 
yourself  about  it,  Bella ;  stay  here  by  all  means 
and  rest  yourself.  Here,  let  me  take  your  hat 
and  shawl." 

He  took  the  hat  from  her  hand ;  he  lifted  the 
shawl  from  her  shoulders  ;  he  looked  down  into 
her  face  admiringly  while  he  did  these  things, 
and  his  mother  felt  unqualified  annoyance.  He 
had  been  all  her  own  son  to  the  best  of  her 
knowledge  before  this,  and  now  this  girl  had 
him  for  her  loving  lackey,  and  she  his  mother 
was  nowhere ! 

"  Mrs.  Claude  must  do  as  she  pleases,"  the 
old  lady  said,  dropping  her  words  out  with  fatal 
distinctness ;  "the  rest  of  us  will  go  in  to  din- 
ner." 

"  Come  up  with  me,  Jack,  while  I  wash  my 
hands,"  Claude  said,  turning  to  a  younger  bro- 
ther ;  "  in  one  moment,  mother,  I  will  be  with 
you — unless  my  wife  would  rather  I  stayed 
with  her?"  he  added,  interrogatively,  turning 
to  Bella,  who  shook  her  head,  and  laughed  a 
negative,  and  assured  him  that  "his  wife  would 
rather  he  went  in  and  enjoyed  himself,"  crouch- 
ing away  into  a  corner  of  a  couch  as  she 
spoke,  and  looking  strangely  pretty  and  defi- 
ant. 

Shall  it  be  written  ?— she  shed  a  few  scalding 
tears  when  they  were  all  gone,  and  she  was  left 
in  that  room  alone.  She  had  come  expecting, 
she  hardly  knew  what ;  but  certainly  not  to  be 
scrutinised  keenly,  and  caused  to  feel  that  she 
was  to  blame  in  ever  so  little,  on  the  first  mo- 
ment of  her  advent  amongst  them.  She  had 
broken  through  a  hedge  of  moral  prickly-pears 
for  Claude,  and  they  were  Claude's  relatives. 
They  should  have  remembered  that  she  had 
done  this,  and  their  manner  should  have  accre- 
dited her  with  it.  Whatever  her  sins  of  omis- 
sion or  commission,  Claude  had  been  the  sole 
cause  of  them.  Tossing  on  the  sofa  there  alone, 
while  her  husband  was  dining  (hilariously  per- 
haps) with  his  family,  she  remembered  all  things 
that  were  past  and  over — amongst  others,  how 
the  Villars'  had  prized  her. 

How  dared  his  mother  glance  thus  coldly  at 
her  ?  She  asked  the  question  aloud  almost,  in 
her  young  wrath  against  injustice.  To  the  one 
in  whom  old  Mrs.  Walsingham  alone  was  inter- 
ested, she  (Bella)  had  been  all  that  was  loving, 
devotional,  faithful,  and  discreet.  That  she  had 


been  the  reverse  of  all  these  things  to  Stanley 
Villars,  she  acknowledged  to  herself  there  in 
her  solitude.  But  it  was  not  for  them — it  was 
not  "  for  these  Walsinghams" — to  point  the  barb 
of  truth  and  dig  it  into  her  breast. 

"These  Walsinghams,"  ah!  she  was  one  of 
them  now,  she  remembered — one  of  them  for 
good  or  ill — their  glory  would  be  her  glory,  their 
interests  hers.  This  was  a  softening  reflection. 

Presently  another  arose.  How  kind  Claude 
had  been  1  That  of  course ;  he  would  always 
be  kind,  for  was  he  not  Claude,  and  she  very 
dearly  fond  of  him.  But  how  thoughtful  he  had 
been,  saying  he  would  stay  there  with  her  in- 
stead of  going  in  and  being  happy  and  hungry 
with  the  rest  when  she  had  avowed  a  want  of 
appetite,  and  a  desire  to  stay  there  alone  and  be 
quiet ! 

"  Unless  my  wife  would  rather  that  I  stayed 
with  her!"  She  recalled  those  words.  She 
muttered  them  over  to  herself.  "As  if  his  '  wife' 
would  have  kept  him  from  dining  for  nothing, 
dear  old  boy !"  she  murmured  fondly;  "  but  how 
angry  his  mother  looked  at  the  bare  thought 
that  I  might  possibly  do  so."  Then  she  thought 
afresh,  how  odd  it  was  that  they  did  not  all 
immediately  feel  her  to  be  the  boon  she  was; 
and  then  she  felt  magnanimous,  "they  would 
know  better  soon,"  and  then  a  little  sleepy. 
Finally,  she  curled  herself  more  closely  in  the 
corner,  and  slumbered  soundly,  in  happy  forget- 
fulness  of  all  things  that  she  disliked  being  re- 
minded of  in  her  waking  moments. 

She  awoke  to  the  whiz  of  voices,  and  the 
whirr  of  garbs  feminine.  Gathering  herself  to- 
gether she  sat  up  and  rubbed  her  eyes,  and  one 
of  Claude's  sisters,  a  Mrs.  Markham,  came  and 
sat  down  by  her,  and  asked  her,  "Was  she 
rested  now,  and  had  she  had  a  nice  sleep  ?  Three 
times  within  the  last  quarter  of  an  hour  mamma 
has  crept  up  to  you  with  a  cup  of  tea  in  her 
hand;  she- thought  you  would  like  it  when  you 
awoke." 

"  That's  very  kind  of  her,"  Bella  answered ; 
she  was  softened  directly  by  this  attention.  She 
spang  up  with  no  signs  of  her  late  fatigue  in 
either  face  or  bearing,  and  went  across  to  Mrs. 
Walsingham,  and  told  her  how  much  obliged 
she  was,  and  how  grateful  for  the  tea,  which  she 
forthwith  sipped,  and  found  cold  and  too  sweet ; 
but  it  was  well  meant,  so  she  drank  it  (and  felt 
slightly  sick)  with  sensations  of  gratitude. 

She  was  still  in  her  travelling  dress — a  dark 
cloth,  with  a  habit  top,  and  a  little  stand-up 
collar  round  her  throat.  It  was  an  unexcep- 
tionable dress  for  the  occasion  for  which  it  had 
been  donned.  But  Mrs.  Walsingham  took  ex- 
ception to  it  and  its  horse-shoe  sleeve-link 
accompaniments  here  at  night  in  her  drawing- 
room. 

The  stately  old  lady,  who  had  adhered  with 
pertinacity  to  so  many  of  the  fashions  of  her 
youth  as  she  could  do  without  rendering  herself 
what  her  daughters  called  "  an  object,"  was  no 
friend  to  the  semi-boyish  style  of  modern  female 
dress.  She  glanced  askance  at  Bella,  not  with 
ill-concealed  dislike,  as  Bella  at  once  imagined, 
but  with  more  than  a  half  dread  that  'her  son 
had  married  the  type  of  the  girl  of  the  day — an 
uncommonly  offensive  genus  in  her  eyee. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  rose  refreshed,  like 
a  young  lion,  from  her  sleep.  She  saw  a  task 


ON  GUARD. 


63 


before  ner,  and  she  felt  fully  equal  to  accom- 
plishing it.  Her  quick  mind  thoroughly  com- 
prehended the  fact  that,  desirable  acquisition  as 
she  was,  the  mother  of  the  man  she  had  mar- 
ried did  not  deem  her  such;  "and  though  I 
won't  cringe  to  her  a  bit,  I  will  win  her  en- 
tirely," she  said  resolutely  to  herself. 

"  She  did  not  sit  down  before  the  fortress  at 
once,  and  attempt  patiently  to  besiege  it.  She 
made  light  skirmishing  attacks  on  the  junior 
members  of  the  family,  and  left  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham  free  to  think  over  her  iniquities  undis- 
turbed for  that  evening.  When  the  men  came 
in  she  whispered  to  Claude,  who  came  to  her 
at  once,  to  "go  and  talk  to  his  mother,"  which 
Claude  did  to  the  best  of  his  ability;  but  it  was 
uphill  work,  as  Mrs.  Walsingham  had  observed 
the  whisper,  and  had  taken  it  into  her  head 
that  her  son's  wife  "was  trying  to  keep  him  to 
herself." 

The  two  members  of  the  family  that  Bella 
liked  best,  as  yet,  were  Mr.  Walsingham  and 
Jack,  the  owner  of  the  remarkable  breed  of  red 
Betters,  of  which  mention  has-  been  made  in  a 
former  chapter.  To  all  outward  seeming,  Mr. 
Walsingham  was  as  dignified,  stately,  and  de- 
termined a  gentleman  as  was  fitting  in  the  head 
of  the  house.  But  straws  show  the  direction  of 
the  current ;  and  the  reader  will  see  in  time,  as 
Bella  did  shortly,,  that  Mr.  "Walsingham's  strong- 
est characteristic  was  'a  deep  reverence  for  his 
wife. 

Moreover,  though  she  liked  him  much,  Bella 
did  not  care  to  battle  with  somnolency  for  his 
attention.  With  a  very  pretty  air  of  dutiful- 
ness  and  gradually  developing  affection,  Mrs. 
Claude  sat  on  a  low  stool  by  the  right  arm  of 
his  chair  for  a  few  minutes,  toning  her  speeches 
to  the  right  family  key  as  far  as  she  could,  and 
giving  Claude  the  place  of  honour,  in  the  brief 
tales  she  told  of  their  tour,  in  a  way  that  she 
judged  would  be  as  pleasing  for  his  father  to 
hear,  as  it  was  to  her  to  speak.  Still,  though 
the  air  of  dutifulness  sat  upon  her  very  natu- 
rally and  pleasingly,  she  was  not  sorry  when 
sleep  carried  the  day  against  her,  leaving  her 
free  to  cultivate  one  of  the  younger  branches  of 
this  tree  on  which  she  was  grafted. 

The  one  to  whom  she  turned  was  the  afore- 
said Jack,  Claude's  third  brother,  who  was  about 
her  own  age,  as  far  as  years  went,  and  therefore 
considerably  younger  in  some  things.  He  had 
been  to  her  wedding,  and  had  then  shown  him- 
self shy  of  her  to  a  slight  degree,  as  he  would 
have  been  of  any  woman  who  was  about  to  be 
married,  and  to  whom  he  might  be  expected  to 
speak  respecting  such  intention.  But  now  all 
the  awkwardness  was  over — there  was  nothing 
more  to  say ;  he  almost  succeeded  in  answering 
her  with  as  little  embarrassment  as  he  would 
have  answered  a  genuine  sister,  when  she  left 
his  father's  side,  and  went  and  placed  herself  on 
a  sofa  by_  him. 

"  I  was  so  glad  to  see  your  face  when  I  came 
into  the  room.  Claude  had  frightened  me ;  he 
said  'Jack  would  be  safe  to  be  gone,'  and  I 
shall  want  you  so  much." 

He  fought  with  his  youth,  and  conquered. 
She  was  only  his  sister  after  all ! 

"I  am  very  glad  that  you  have  come  now 
you  have.  I  shall  be  off.'  in  a  fortnight,  and  I 
want  to  have  two  or  three  days  with  Claude 


with  Markham's  hounds.  We  haven't  had'  a 
day  together  for  years — neyer  since  I  was  a 
boy." 

Jack  Walsingham  was  a  handsome,  fine,  stal- 
wart young  fellow,  with  bright  curly  brown 
hair,  and  honest  blue  eyes,  full  of  life  and  health 
and  pluck  and  vigour,  and  with  none  of  these 
thingr  toned  down  as  yet.  The  ardent-spirited 
part  of  her  nature  sympathised  with  him  at 
once,  so  she  checked  the  smile  that  began  to 
quiver  on  her  lips  when  he  said  he  had  "not 
ridden  with  Claude  since  he  was  a  boy,"  and 
answered  the  boy  animatedly. 

"Is  Mr.  Markham,  your  brother-in-law,  mas- 
ter of.  the  hounds  ?" 

"  He  has  a  pack — foxhounds,  too.  You  must 
go  and  see  them  throw  off  when  they  next 
meet." 

"  Indeed  I  will !     Where  will  they  meet  ?" 

"  At  Horsley  Hollow,  about  two  miles  from 
here.  We  always  have  a  good  day  when  the 
meet  is  there;  sure  to  find  soon  in  Horsley 

Wood.     And but  do  you  care  for  hunting  ? 

Perhaps  you  don't ;  and  if  so,  I  shall  bore  you 
if  I  talk  about  it." 

She  shook  her  head.  "Do  I  not  care  for  it ! 
You- won't  bore  me,  never  fear;  you  must  tell 
me  all*  about  the  manners  and  customs  of  your 
shire  hunting-field.  Does  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  ride  ?" 

"What I  Ellen?" 

"Yes!" 

uNo ;  Markham  wouldn't  let  her  if  she  could, 
and  she  couldn't  if  he  would.  He  hates  to  see 
a  woman  in  the  field." 

Mrs.  Claude  looked  at  Mr.  Markham  as  her 
young  brother-in-law  said  this,  and  saw  a  stout, 
tall,  heavy-looking  man,  with  an  impassive  red 
face. 

"  Hates  to  see  a  woman  in  the  field,  does  he  ? 
I  can  fancy  it;  he  looks  fat  and  selfish." 

"The  fact  is,"  Jack  replied,  confidentially 
putting  his  arm  along  on  the  back  of  the  sofa, 
and  leaning  nearer  to  Mrs  Claude — "the  fact 
is,  Markham  doesn't  hunt  them  well  at  all ; 
he  can't  ride  a  bit ;  he  always  keeps  along  on 
the  roads,  and  creeps  through  gates.  He's 
awfully  afraid  of  coming  to  grief;  so,  if  there's 
a  lady  in  the  field  who  does  take  anything,  ho 
is  about  the  only  man  who  dare  not  follow, 
and  then  he  gets  laughed  at.  He  does  all  he 
can  to  stop  it ;  says  women  override  the  hounds 
and  get  in  the  way.  But  it  is  all  because  it  is 
awkward  even  for  him  to  shirk  what  a  lady  ' 
goes  at." 

"It  must  be  great  fun  to  see  him,"  Bella 
said,  reflectively,  looking  across  at  the  object 
of  Jack's  remarks  once  more.  "  Do  you  know 
that  my  riding-horse  has  come  down  with  me  ?'' 

"  Claude  mentioned  it  at  dinner." 

"  Look  here,  Jack,  I  will  go  out  on  him 
when  the  meet  is  at  Horsley  Hollow,"  she  said 
abruptly. 

"You  will  ride  to  see  them  throw  off?" 

"Yes,  and  then  follow." 

"By  Jove,  do!"  he  exclaimed,  delightedly. 
He  had  to  put  a  severe  restraint  upon  himself        , 
in  order  not  to  risk  offending  her,  by  telling  her 
that  she  was  "  a  brick  to  think  of  it !" 

"Hush!"  she  whispered,  laughing,  "don't 
say  a  word,  or  Mr.  Markham  will  be  raising 
objections  to  it,  probably,  and  I  could  not  set 


ON  GUARD. 


him  at  defiance.  I  suppose  he  migat  refuse  to 
hunt  them  while  I  am  down  here,  if  he  knew 
beforehand  of  my  intention ;  but  I  don't  think 
he  will  be  silly  enough  to  call  them  off  when 
he  finds  me  in  the  field?" 

"No,  humbug  as  he  is,  he  won't  do  that.  I 
shall*  go  out  and  have  a  look  at  your  horse  pre- 
sently. What  has  Claude  done  with  the  pup  I 
gave  him  ?" 

"  Kept  it." 

"  I  thought  he  wanted  it  for "  The  boy 

paused  suddenly;  he  was  going  to  say  "for 
Stanley  Yillars."  The  name  of  Claude's  old 
friend  was  a  household  word  at  the  Court ;  but 
he  paused,  remembering  what  Claude's  old 
friend  had  been  to  Claude's  young  wife. 

"You  were  going  to  say  you  thought  the 
puppy  was  for  Stanley  Yillars,"  she  said  very 
gently,  with  a  tenderness  spreading  like  a  film 
over  her  face  as  she  spoke,  which  the  incon- 
siderate Jack  found  most  marvellously  touch- 
ing. "I  gave  Stanley  a  dog,  and  then  he  did 
not  care  to  have  the  setter  puppy." 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  began,  "I  didn't 
mean " 

"  I  know  you  didn't — don't  say  another  word 
about  it ;  I  know  you  didn't  mean  it.  I  feel 
very  sure  of  you,  Jack." 

She  rose  when  she  had  said  that,  and  went 
and  seated  herself  by  Mrs.  Markham's  side, 
leaving  Jack  uncertain  whether  she  was  more 
of  a  forgiving  angel  than  he  was  of  a  "blunder- 
ing brute."  She  was  quite  the  ideal  sister  to 
so  young  a  man  as  Jack  Walsingham ;  she  was 
interested  in  his  breed  of  setters,  and  she  pur- 
posed riding  to  hounds  for  the  sake  of  putting 
"  old  Markham  out !" 

But  she  was  not  the  ideal  sister  in  Mrs. 
Markham's  eyes.  Claude's  eldest  sister  had 
been  mated  with,  an  uncongenial  man  from 
very  early  girlhood,  and  she  had  always  de- 
ported herself  admirably,  and  suffered  no  man 
to  suppose  from  her  manner  that  the  uncon- 
geniality  was  in  reality  a  wearing  sorrow  to 
her.  She  was  a  remarkably  undemonstrative 
woman,  one  who  went  on  doing  her  duty  in 
such  a  perfect  way  day  by  day  that  no  one  had 
the  shadow  of  a  cause  to  imagine  that  the 
shadow  of  a  doubt  ever  crossed  her  mind  as  to 
this  lot  of  hers  being  as  blissful  as  it  might  be. 
She  was  good,  just,  and  true  as  steel ;  but  she 
was  not  a  lenient  woman.  She  would  assist 
the  erring,  but  she  could  not  deal  gently  with 
them.  She  would  bind  up  wounds  with  a 
strong  hand  if  they  came  to  her  to  be  bound 
up ;  but  she  would  not  pour  oil  into  them. 
She  rather  preferred  treating  them  with  balsam, 
which  was  wholesome,  though  it  made  them 
smart. 

Mrs.  Claude  opened  the  conversation. 

"What  is  that  combination  of  glass  and  lea- 
ther and  wool  to  be  when  it  is  finished,  Ellen  ?" 
she  asked,  looking  at  the  work  on  which  Mrs. 
Markham  was  employing  herself  assiduously. 

"  A  sofa  cushion." 

"It  will  be  uncomfortable,  but  pretty.  I 
have  not  seen  anything  of  the  sort  before. 
Leather  for  the  grounding!— it's  very  pretty !" 

"  You  are  very  good  to.  admire  it  so  freely ; 
I  should  hardly  have  supposed  that  you  had 
much  taste  for  such  things." 

"Nor  have  I,  as  far  as  doing  them  myself 


goes ;  but  I  think  some  of  them  very  pretty, 
though  scarcely  worth  the  trouble  of  doing." 

"  You  are  so  much  better  employed  now,  for 
instance,"  Mrs.  Markham  said  quietly. 

Bella  laughed. 

"  So  I  am ;  I  am  amusing  you,  or  trying  to 
amuse  you,  and  that  is  a  more  praiseworthy  oc- 
cupation than  studding  a  sofa  cushion  with 
beads  and  bright  nails.  How  they'll  hurt 
people  1" 

Mrs.  Markham  liked  the  unresentful  tone. 
She  had  more  than  half  expected  that  Bella 
would  either  have  answered  her  in  anger,  or 
not  have  answered  her  at  all.  So  she  relaxed 
a  trifle,  and  said — 

"  While  you  are  staying  here,  you  had  better 
take  to  some  such  occupation  as  this.  Days  in 
a  country  house  are  very  long  and  very  dull 
very  often  in  the  winter,  unless  you  can  find 
pleasure  in  some  such  occupation." 

"  Oh,  I'm  never  dull  in  the  country — there's 
always  so  much  to  do — unless  it  pours  with  rain 
and  one  can't  get  out." 

"  Those  are  the  liveliest  days  very  often,  I 
have  found,  for  then  the  gentlemen  stay  in,  and 
we  are  obliged  to  exert  ourselves  to  keep  dull 
care  away." 

"I  was  going  to  say  that,"  Mrs.  Claude  re- 
plied ;  "  even  on  such  days  we  can  act  charades 
and  play  billiards,  and  do,  oh!  all  sorts  of 
things.  I  have  a  husband  now ;  it  will  be  his 
bounden  duty  to  see  that  I  don't  stagnate ;  but 
I  know  "  (and  she  laughed)  "  that  I  have  never 
found  it  the  least  dull  in  a  country  house." 

Mrs.  Markham  regarded  this  as  an  indecorous 
allusion  to  former  experiences,  which  she  shud- 
dered in  her  soul  to  think  her  brother's  wife 
should  have  had.  She  fancied  that  Bella  was 
thinking  of  some  of  the  many  whom  report 
said  she  had  smiled  upon.  Such  thoughts  Mrs. 
Markham  held  to  be  fraught  with  danger,  so 
she  looked  rather  sternly  at  the  offender  as  she 
said— 

"Yes,  you  have  a  husband  now  ;  as  his  sis- 
ter I  must  express  a  hope  that  you  will  not  for- 
get that  fact  when  recalling  bygone  hours  in 
other  country  houses,  either  for  our  benefit  or 
to  your  own  mind." 

"Good  gracious!  there  was  no  harm  in 
them!  What  do  you  mean?"  Bella  cried. 
Then  the  recollection  of  Stanley  Yillars  came 
over  her,  and  she  felt  humbled  and  silenced. 
That  episode  in  her  life  was  known  to  Mrs. 
Markham,  who,  with  such  knowledge,  might 
well  deem  her  capable  of  further  fickleness  and 
faithlessness.  Still  it  was  hard  to  be  distrusted 
by  the  friends  of  the  one  who  had  been  the 
cause  of  that  fickleness  and  faithlessness.  Yery 
hard,  after  all  she  had  gone  through  for  Claude 
— after  all  the  misery  her  waning  faith  had 
caused  her — after  all  those  inward  struggles  to 
do  right — after  all  the  agony  their  failure  cost 
— after  a  lifetime  of  complete  exemption  from 
blame, — it  was  very  hard  to  be  condemned  and 
coldly  regarded ! 

For  a  minute  or  two  she  sat,  a  prey  to  the 
throes  of  conscience.  Then  anger  filled  her 
soul.  Then  the  pity  for  oneself  that  is  born  of 
bodily  fatigue,  and  a  consciousness  of  being 
just  a  little  wrong  and  just  a  little  wronged, 
overwhelmed  her,  and  she  dropped  her 
face  down  upon  her  convulsively-twitching 


ON  GUARD. 


65 


nands,  and  began  to  cry  with  passionate 
force. 

In  a  moment  Claude  was  by  her  side  and  the 
rest  were  round  her,  and  in  another  moment 
she  was  alive  to  the  full  folly  of  her  act. 

"  My  own  darling,  what  is  it  ?"  Claude  asked. 
"What  the  devil  has  any  one  said  to  her?"  he 
continued,  looking  angrily  at  each  one  in  turn, 
but  especially  at  Jack,  who  was  looking  con- 
science-smitten on  account  of  that  speech  he  had 
made  about  the  setter  pup  and  Stanley  Villars. 

"  No  one  has  said  anything,"  Bella  answer- 
ed, striving  to  clear  up.  "  Who  should  ?  Don't 
think  it ;  I  am  a  goose !" 

"  I  am  the  culprit,  Claude,"  Mrs.  Markham 
put  in  quietly.  "  In  all  kindness  I  made  a  re- 
mark to  your  wife  that  seems  to  have  offended 
her  very  much."  . 

"  No,  it  hasn't,"  Bella  said  promptly.  "  I'm 
not  offended — I'm  tired  and  a  goose,  as  I  said 
before," 

"  I  cannot  have  my  wife  worried,  or  suffer 
remarks  to  be  made  to  her  that  make  her  cry, 
whether  she  is  a  'goose  '  or  not,"  Claude  said; 
and  Mrs.  Markham  turned  away  to  her  leather 
and  glass  beads  and  wool  again  with  a  feeling 
that  her  brother's  bride  was  a  mistake,  which 
it  behoved  her  to  rectify  if  possible. 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

TOO  IMPULSIVE. 

IT  has  been  said  that  Claude  found  it  up-hill 
work  to  carry  on  a  conversation  with  his  mo- 
ther that  evening.  Mrs.  Walsingham  had 
started  on  the  supposition  that  her  son  had 
Bought  her  side  in  opposition  to  the  wishes  of 
his  wife ;  and  this  supposition  rendered  her 
inaccessible,  so  to  say.  She  was  very  curious 
— curious  as  only  a  woman  can  be — about  this 
marriage  her  son  had  made,  and  its  attendant 
circumstances.  She  longed  to  know  how  the 
other  affair  had  been  broken  off,  and  how  this 
one  had  come  on.  She  also  wanted  to  know 
the  exact  amount  of  Mrs.  Claude's  fortune, 
report  having  varied  considerably  on  that  last 
point. 

Curious  as  she  was,  however,  she  would  not 
take  the  honest  and  straight  road  to  arriving  at 
a  knowledge  of  what  excited  her  curiosity,  by 
asking  him  outright  the  how  and  why  of  it  all. 
She  was  too  proud  to  seek  a  confidence  that 
was  not  given.  He  was  her  own  son,  and  too 
proud  to  offer  a  confidence  that  was  not  sought. 

For  the  last  six  or  seven  years  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham had  nourished  and  cherished  a  scheme  in 
her  heart.  It  was  a  fair,  bright  scheme ;  and 
it  was  founded  upon  a  fair,  bright  girl,  whom 
she  had  designed,  when  opportunity  offered,  to 
marry  to  her  eldest  son.  The  girl  was  a  Miss 
Harper,  the  well-portioned  daughter  of  a  neigh- 
bouring country  gentleman.  She  had  won  upon 
Mrs.  Walsingham  when  a  mere  child,  and  her 
growth  in  grace  and  guilelessness  had  been 
watched  with  loving  eyes  by  the  mother  who 
meant  her  for  her  son. 

It  was  the  thought  of  Grace  Harper  that 
pointed  the  gain  Mrs.  Walsingham  felt  in  this 
rriage  Claude  had  made.  On  one  or  two 
n 


occasions,  when  Grace  had  been  spending  long, 
dull  days  with  Mrs.  Walsingham  in  the  solitude 
of  that  old  west  country  house,  the  hostess  had 
striven  to  brighten  the  hours  to  the  young 
guest  by  talking  about  Claude.  She  had  talked 
about  Claude  in  that  wonderful  maternal  tone 
which  conveys  to  the  listener  the  flattering 
conviction  that  she  may  not  only  speak,  but 
may  think,  with  affection — affection  tempered 
with  awe,  of  course,  but  still  affection— of  the 
spoken  about.  Worse  than  this  :  with  even 
greater,  more  lamentable  indiscretion,  she  had 
lately  hinted,  in  unmistakable  terms,  that  it 
was  upon  the  cards  that  the  glory  of  being 
Claude's  wife  should  be  Miss  Grace's. 

Then  a  rumour  had  been  heard  in  the  land 
relative  to  Florence  Villars — relative  to  a  "sort 
of  attachment  that,  there  was  a  sort  of  report," 
Claude  had  formed  for  the  sister  of  his  friend. 
On  this  Miss  Gracie  had  gone  into  gentle  melan- 
choly, and  red  rims  to  her  eyes ;  and  Mrs.  Wal- 
singham had  gone  to  her  davenport,  and  de- 
spatched a  searching  inquiry  into  the  truth  of 
said  statement  to  Claude.  All  this  had  hap- 
pened about  the  period  of  the  Richmond  din- 
ner, just  previous  to  Claude's  going  down  to 
Denham.  The  amiable  nature  of  the  reassuring 
negative  he  returned  to  his  mother's  question 
was -due  principally  to  his  pleasure  at  finding 
her  so  far  off  the  Circe  scent. 

During  the  few  days  he  had  spent  at  the 
Court  before  he  went  to  town,  and  met  Bella 
driving  her  chestnuts  in  the  park,  he  had  every 
opportunity  afforded  him  of  falling  in  love  with 
Miss  Harper.  She  had  come,  at  his  mother's 
special  request,  to  stay  in  the  house  while  he 
stayed ;  and  Mrs.  Walsingham  sedulously  es- 
chewed other  visitors,  and  went  to  sleep  for  a 
couple  of  hours  every  evening.  But  it  was  all 
of  no  avail.  Miss  Harper  resembled  a  daughter 
of  the  gods,  in  that  she  "  was  divinely  tall,  and 
most  divinely  fair;"  but  Claude  apostrophised 
Jove  about  her  only  when  declaring  her  to  be 
dull. 

He  had  fully  fathomed  the  plan  that  had 
been  made  for  his  happiness,  but  he  had  ever 
affected  to  be  innocently  unconscious  of  it, 
deeming  it  a  pity  to  spoil  the  enjoyment  his 
mother  derived  from  perfecting  and  touching  it 
up.  Now,  however,  that  all  was  at  an  end, 
and  other  'topics  appeared  unmanageable  be- 
tween his  mother  and  himself,  he  reverted  to 
Miss  Harper  by  asking — 

"  By  the  way,  mother,  is  Gracie  coming  here  ? 
I  thought  she  was  always  at  the  Court  when 
anything  was  going  on." 

"  I  really  don't  know  why  you  should  have 
supposed  so.  Dear  girl !  no ;  she  is  not  coming. 
She  is  in  such  great  request  that  she  cannot 
spare  a  day  for  us  for  the  next  month." 

"I  only  know  what  she  told  me  herself. 
She  said,  when  I  asked  her  when  I  should  see 
her  again,  that  she  '  would  probably  be  here 
when  I  came  the  next  time,  as  she  was  always 
with  Mrs.  Walsingham  when  anything  was 
going  on.'  Now  there  is  even  more  going  on 
than  she  could  possibly  have  anticipated,  seeing 
I  have  not  come  alone." 

"Your  wife  would  hardly  care  for  Grace's 
society." 

"Probably  not;  I  found  her  the  reverse  of 
enlivening." 


66 


ON  GUARD. 


"  My  dear  Claude,  remember  1  she  is  a  friend 
of  mine!" 

"  She  made  tea  very  prettily,  didn't  she  ?'' 
Claude  asked,  laughingly.  "It  was  quite  a 
study  to  see  her  poise  her  white  hand  on  the 
teapot  cover,  and  keep  it  there  standing  out  in 
bold  relief  while  she  debated  with  me  circum- 
spectly whether  or  not  more  water  should  be 
ooured  in!" 

"  She  was  a  thorough  lady,"  Mrs.  Walsing- 
.iam  replied  slowly;  "a  pure-minded  girl,  with 
nothing  volatile  in  either  manner  or  disposi- 
tion." 

Claude  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"  I  hope  she  will  be  able  to  spare  you  a  few 
days  before  we  leave,  mother." 

"  Extremely  improbable.  You  will  see  her 
though,  Claude;  for  her  cousin  and  his  bride 
are  coming  to  stay  with  them,  and  we  must  ask 
them  to  dinner." 

"  Which  cousin  ?" 

"Her  mother's  nephew,  Lord  Lexley." 

Claude  started — inside,  not  externally.  He 
bad  heard  of  Adele's  marriage  when  he  came 
hack  to  town,  but  he  had  little  thought  to  meet 
her  ladyship  as  a  domesticated  animal  so  soon, 
down  in  these  pure-minded  wilds. 

"  Oh !  Lexley  and  his  wife  are  coming,  are 
they  ?  Who's  the  lady,  do  you  know  ?" 

"An  admirable  young  creature,  an  Italian 
countess,  who  went  on  the  opera  boards  in 
order  to  support  her  widowed  mother,"  Mrs. 
Walsingham  replied.  Then  Claude  said,  "Ah! 
really!"  and  his  mother  went  on  to  tell  him 
much  that  was  new  about  Lady  Lexley,  which 
did  immense  credit  to  her  ladyship's  powers  of 
invention. 

"I  almost  wonder  you  have  not  heard  of 
her,  Claude,"  Mrs.  Walsingham  said,  when 
they  had  thoroughly  talked  through  the  topic. 
"  The  Harpers  say  that  she  regrets  it  very 
much,  but  that  she  has  not  been  able  to  avoid 
publicity." 

"No  doubt  she  was  desirous  of  doing  so," 
he  said  drily;  " opera  singers  generally  are.  I 
have  heard  of  her,  of  course — heard  her  too 
often.  By  Jove !  she  will  be  an  acquisition ! 
I  hadn't  counted  on  this  when  I  came  down," 
he  continued  to  himself,  his  eyes  sparkling 
with  excitement.  Just  then  his  wife's  sobs 
fell  upon  his  ears,  and  he  speedily  forgot  the 
existence  of  Lady  Lexley — speedily  forgot  it 
for  a  time. 

The  following  morning  Mrs.  Claude  heard 
with  satisfaction  that  the  hounds  would  meet 
at  Horsley  Hollow  on  the  12th.  This  was 
Friday,  the  7th.  Wednesday  would  shortly  be 
upon  them.  So  she  resolved  to  go  out  daily 
on  her  new  horse,  and  get  him  well  accustomed 
to  her  hand  and  the  country  before  the  event- 
ful day. 

Claude  was  ready  to  go  for  a  ride  with  her 
"anywhere  at  any  hour,"  he  said.  When  he 
said  this,  however,  Bella  noticed  that  his  father 
•ooked  a  little  disappointed,  and  she  fathomed 
the  cause  of  that  disappointment  at  once. 

"  Unless  Mr.  Walsingham  wants  you  to  ride 
round  the  land  with  him,  Claude." 

"Oh!  any  day  will  do  for  that,  my  dear," 
Mr.  Walsingham  replied  politely. 

"Ah,  but  you  would  like  him  to  go  to-day; 
of  course  you  would ;  how  very  natural  1" 


"Jack  can  go  with  you,  Bella,"  Claude  sug 
gested. 

"  Or  can't  I  ride  with  you  and  your  father? 
should  I  be  in  the  way  ?" 

"Not  in  the  way,"  the  old  gentleman  ex- 
plained with  polite  anxiety,  "  but  it  might  be 
tedious ;  for  we  shall  be  standing  about  looking 
at  improvements  that  don't  interest  ladies 
Tour  horse  is  fresh  most  likely ;  he  might  give 
you  trouble." 

"  He  is  fresh,  and  no  mistake,"  Jack  put  in 
"You  had  better  come  out  with  me,  Mrs. 
Claude,  along  a  good  riding  road.  We  wiL 
give  him  a  breather." 

"  I  think  that  will  be  the  best  plan.  Won't 
you  go  with  us,  Ellen?" 

Mrs.  Markham  shook  her  head. 

"  Jack  and  I  had  your  horse  out  this  morning 
before  you  were  awake,  Bella,"  her  husband 
said  to  her.  "  He  is  too  good  at  his  fences  for 
a  lady's  hack,  Markham  says." 

"I  thought  a  lady's  horse  couldn't 'be  too 
good  at  his  fences  ?"  Bella  said,  looking  at  Mr. 
Markham. 

"A  lady's  hunter  cannot,  but  you  won't 
hunt?" 

"  Why  not  ?"  she  asked  quickly. 

"Oh !  I  know  of  no  reason  against  it,  if  your 
husband  does  not,  Mrs.  Claude.  He  is  a  nice 
horse,  a  very  nice  horse,"  Mr.  Markham  con- 
tinued, with  the  air  of  one  who  would  change 
the  conversation ;  "as  sound  before  as  he  is 
behind.  I  see  he  touches  his  fences." 

"  Yes,  he  is  satisfactory  enough  as  far  as  he 
has  gone  yet,"  Claude  rejoined.  Then  he  gave 
his  wife  some  cautions  about  her  method  of 
treating  him  at  first  starting.  "  Be  very  steady 
with  him  at  first,  and  don't  lose  yourself  with 
Jack  as  you  did  with  Vengeance  and  Hill." 

"  Was  Vengeance  the  name  of  the  horse  you 
were  riding  on  the  occasion  of  your  first  ro- 
mantic meeting  with  Claude?"  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham asked. 

"  Yes,"  Bella  replied  ;  and  she  blushed  a  lit- 
tle as  she  remembered  what  that  meeting  had 
cost  Stanley  Villars. 

"  What  is  your  new  horse's  name  ?" 

"  Devilskin." 

"A  horrid  name  for  a  lady's  horse!"  Mrs. 
Walsingham  remarked — superciliously,  Bella 
thought. 

"  But  J  have  given  it  to  him ;  so  whether 
it's  '  horrid '  or  not,  he  will  have  to  be  known 
by  it,  I  am  afraid,"  Mrs.  Claude  rejoined.  Then 
Claude  got  up  rather  hastily,  and  asked — 

"  When  will  you  have  your  horse,  Bella  ? — 
say  twelve  ?"  in  a  tone  that  showed  his  wife 
that  his  wishes  tended  to  a  subversion  of  the 
subject  in  dispute  between  herself  and  his  mo- 
ther. 

Devilskin  came  round  at  twelve,  Jack  fol- 
lowing on  his  own  horse  with  that  in  his  man- 
ner of  following  that  would  lead  one  to  suppose 
that  he  desired  to  have  it  believed  that  he  was 
there  by  accident,  and  was  not  at  all  desirous 
of  escorting  his  sister-in-law.  He  was  but 
twenty — he  was  very  young — and  his  youth 
was  apt  to  rise  up  in  judgment,  as  it  were,  at 
unforeseen  times,  and  convict  him  of  having 
acted  or  spoken  as  it  behoved  "  a  man  "  not  to 
act  or  speak. 

He  was  but  twenty ;  but  he  was  honest  and 


ON  GUARD. 


67 


handsome,  frank  and  fearless,  tender  (when  no 
one  was  by  to  see  him  thus  tripping),  and  true 
as  steel.  These  are  qualities  that  tell  on  a  wo- 
man, let  the  man  to  whom  they  belong  be  to 
her  what  he  may — a  stranger  or  one  of  her 
own  kindred.  These  are  qualities  that  must 
and  do  tell,  and  it  is  only  fitting  that  they 
should  do  so. 

"Take  care  of  her,  Jack!"  Claude  said,  as  he 
put  his  wife  up,  and  Bella  looked  round  laugh- 
ing at  her  young  escort  in  a  way  that  caused 
his  blood  to  seethe  and  bubble  with  a  variety 
of  emotions.  His  brother's  caution  implied  a 
doubt,  he  fancied,  and  Bella's  laugh  seemed  to 
cast  a  shadow  of  ridicule  over  his  protectorship 
of  her.  He  felt  very  young  and  very  uncom- 
fortable, but  intensely  loyal  and  devoted,  as  he 
rode  down  to  the  gate  by  her  side. 

Mrs.  Claude  saw  the  constraint  that  had 
come  over  him,  and  Mrs.  Claude  thoroughly 
appreciated  the  cause  of  it.  He  had  been  free 
and  graciously  unreserved  with  her  last  night, 
but  in  broad  daylight  he  remembered  that  she 
was  a  stranger  to  him,  and  a  young  woman, 
and  the  freedom  and  unreserve  vanished.  The 
young  lady  looked  at  him  cautiously  now  and 
again  as  she  rode  gently  along  by  his  side,  and 
she  pitied  the  boy  on  whose  cheek  and  mind 
there  still  dwelt  this  delicate  bloom. 

She  tried  two  or  three  topics  which  she 
trusted  might  induce  him  to  forget  himself— 
the  scenery,  the  family,  the  Court,  &c. — and  all 
were  of  no  avail.  Then,  she  thought,  "  I  have 
reserved  my  heaviest  shot  till  the  last ;  if  that 
falls  flat,  Jack  and  I  will  have  but  a  dull  ride 
of  it," 

"Could  you  take  me  to  Horsley  Hollow, 
Jack  ?"  she  asked,  in  as  confidential  a  tone  as 
his  constrained  manner  would  permit  her  to 
use.  "  Could  you  take  me  to  Horsley  Hollow, 
Jack,  and  show  what  the  land  is  like  about 
it?" 

The  shot  told  instantaneously.  He  turned 
his  head  and  looked  full  upon  her  for  the  first 
time  since  they  had  started. 

"  If  I  showed  you  some  of  the  stiffest  places 
you  would  know  the  worst  Devilskin  would 
have  to  do  when  the  day  comes — if  Claude  lets 
you  ride — wouldn't  you  ?"  he  replied. 

"Yes.  If  Claude  lets  me  ridel  why,  of 
course,  Claude  will  let  me  ride." 

"  I  will  show  you  the  way  if  you  like,  then," 
he  said.  "This  old  fellow" — he  patted  his 
horse  as  he  spoke — "knows  every  stick,  and 
stone,  and  drop  of  water  about  here:  he's  an 
awfully  safe  lead." 

u  Then  I  shall  follow  him:  you  won't  be  too 
rash,  I'm  sure." 

"  That  I  won't." 

"  Did  you  mean  that  you'd  show  me  the  way 
to-day  ?" 

"I  think ."  He  paused  and  faltered. 

His  judgment  told  him  that  Devilskin  had  bet- 
ter learn  more  both  of  the  lady  and  the  locality 
before  he  was  taken  'cross  country.  But  his 
inclinations  led  him  to  please  his  brother's  wife, 
and  his  own  horse,  and  himself,  by  showing  her 
the  way  without  further  delay. 

"  What,  do  you  think,"  she  asked,  "  that  Mr. 
Markham  would  fathom  my  intention  if  he 
heard  of  our  practising  over  the  ground,  and 
frustrate  it  ?" 


"Perhaps  that:  he  would  if  he  could." 

"Ahl  but  he  couldn't,"  she  replied  with  a 
little  decided  laugh ;  "he  couldn't.  Who  could, 
indeed,  if  I  would  go — if  Claude  did  not  ob- 
ject ?"  she  added  hastily. 

"  Markham  would  be  making  objections,  and 
pointing  out  things  to  Claude  that  might  make 
Claude  object — if  Markham  knew  of  it  long  be- 
forehand, that  is ;  he's  so  slow  that  he  can  do 
nothing  if  you  don't  give  him  time." 

"  He  wouldn't  know  anything  about  it,  Jack," 
she  said  suddenly,  as  they  came  upon  a  short 
bit  of  road  that  led  them  right  down  to  the  side 
of  a  three-cornered  well- wooded  dell.  "  This  is 
Horsley  Hollow  I'm  sure.  Now,  when  the  fox 
breaks  cover,  which  way  is  he  most  likely  to 
go  ?  Show  me,  and  we  will  ride  that  way,  and 
we'll  say  nothing  to  Mr.  Markham  about  it 
we  won't  mention  it  at  home." 

Jack  hesitated,  and  assoiled  his  conscience, 

"I  wouldn't  be  the  one  to  take  you  along 
over  anything  if  I  hadn't  seen  what  your  horse 
can  do,  and  if  I  hadn't  heard  Claude  say  that 
Devilskin  was  a  clipper  at  his  fences,"  he  said 
slowly. 

"  No,  of  course  not !"  she  replied  with  anima- 
tion. She  was  eager  as  a  child  to  try  whethei 
crossing  the  country  was  as  delightful  in  prac- 
tice as  it  was  in  theory. 

"  Then  come  along,"  he  said,  turning  round 
and  putting  his  horse  to  climb  over  a  bit  of  a 
broken  bank,  with  more  a  gutter  than  a  ditch 
beyond  it. 

She  followed  on  Devilskin.  "  He  will  creep 
over :  it  is  nothing  to  lift  him  to,"  her  brother- 
in-law  cried,  leaning  round  to  look  at  her. 
Mrs.  Claude  relied  on  her  horse's  sagacity  to  do 
what  was  expected  and  prognosticated  of  him, 
and  consequently  received  a  slight  shock.  Devil- 
skin  elected  to  make  a  mighty  leap  of  the  gut- 
ter, and  his  mistress  came  forward  almost  on  to 
his  neck. 

Mrs.  Claude  recovered  herself  in  an  instant — 
recovered  her  seat,  that  is,  but  not  her  equani- 
mity. The  leap,  even  as  her  horse  had  taken 
it,  had  been  a  mere  nothing — a  trifle  suited  to 
the  meapest  equestrian  capacity  had  she  been 
prepared  for  it.  But  she  had  not  been  pre- 
pared for  it.  She  had,  in  truth,  been  prepared 
for  something  quite  the  reverse,  and  she  felt 
annoyed  with  herself,  her  horse,  and  her  com- 
panion. 

The  mighty  leap  over  the  tiny  ditch — the 
much  ado  about  nothing  that  Devilskin  had 
been  guilty  of — had  landed  them  in  a  pasture 
intersected  with  ditches.  "The  last  time  we 
drew  the  Hollow  the  fox  made  right  away  out 
there ;  over  that  corner,  and  along  the  road  for 
a  bit,  and  then  across  a  field  to  that  dark  spot, 
do  you  see  ?  Follow  the  direction  of  my  whip. 
That's  another  cover.  There  we  were  at  fault  : 
and  that  Markham  is  such  a  humbug ;  he  made 
such  a  noise  when  he  was  taking  the  hounds 
in,  that  he  didn't  hear  a  fellow  halloo,  or  didn't 
know  where  the  halloo  came  from,  and  so  he 
rode  a  couple  of  miles  the  wrong  way,  and  lost 
the  fox." 

This  was  a  tremendous  long  speech,  as  the 
reader  will  doubtless  have  observed,  to  him  or 
herself  disparagingly.  When  he  had  communi- 
cated it,  they  found  themselves  near  to  the 
corner  which  Jack  had  indicated  as  the  corner 


68 


ON  GUARD. 


over  which  the  last  fox  they  'aad  drawn  in 
Horsley  Hollow  had  made  his  exit  from  the 
pasture. 

"Perhaps  the  next  won't  go  over  there," 
Mrs.  Claude  observed;  "but  still  we  may  as 
well  try  it,  may  we  not,  Jack?" 

"Yes,  we  may  as  well,"  he  replied,  dubiously. 
That  affair  at  the  other  side  of  the  pasture  had 
rather  shaken  his  confidence ;  he  was  not  quite 
sure  in  what,  though — whether  in  Bella's  horse, 
or  horse womanship. 

"Yes,  we  may  as  well,"  he  repeated;  they 
were  n earing  the  corner  now.  "Look  here. 
I'll  tell  you,  it  isn't  much  of  a  jump,  only  it's 
rather  a  drop  into  the  road.  Let  him  have  his 
head  when  he's  rising  to  it,  and  mind  you  have 
him  well  in  hand  when  he's  landing." 

Bella  listened  with  understanding.  "I  see," 
she  replied ;  "  all  right;  will  you  go  first  ?" 

He  would  go  first.  His  steady  old  hunter 
went  over  like  a  bird,  and  as  his  heels  vanished, 
Devilskin  began  to  fidget,  and  wheeled  half 
round. 

"  Keep  him  at  it — come  along,"  Jack  cried 
from  the  other  side ;  and  Bella  having  pulled 
her  horse  round  to  it  determinately,  Devilskin 
went  at  it  with  a  rush. 

For  a  moment  or  two  Jack  experienced  the 
sort  of  elation  we  are  all  apt  to  feel  when  we 
fancy  that  a  thing  of  this  sort  is  about  to  be 
done  remarkably  well.  Mrs.  Claude  was  settled 
well  down  in  her  saddle,  he  marked  that.  Her 
figure  swayed  as  the  figure  only  can  when  you 
have  come  down  to  it  tightly,  and  are  vibrating 
to  the  horse ;  but  though  she  had  come  down 
to  her  saddle  well,  her  seat  was  too  forward  a 
ne,  if  not  for  the  jump,  at  least  for  the  way 
)evilskin  was  going  to  do  it. 

A  moment  more  1  Devilskin  was  over  the 
uedge,  and  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  was  over 
the  near  pummel,  upon  the  road,  under  Devil- 
skin's  forefeet,  apparently. 

What  misery  one  moment  of  time  is  all-suffi- 
cient for !  I  am  not  about  to  moralize  a  long 
unbroken  paragraph  of  my  own;  reflections 
would  be  as  ineffably  tedious  to  myself  as  to 
the  rest  of  the  enlightened  reading  public ;  still 
I  cannot  help  marvelling  at  the  muchness  of 
misery  which  may  be  endured  in  a  moment. 
It  is  so  complete,  so  perfect  a  thing  of  its  kind, 
that  misery,  that  it  might  have  occupied  the 
best  years  of  the  life  of  a  master  in  the  art  of 
creating  wretchedness.  There  is  nothing  jagged 
or  unfinished  about  it ;  it  appears  to  be  round 
and  never  ending. 

Jack  "Walsingham  had  such  a  moment  as 
Devilskin  landed,  and  his  brother's  bride  came 
off  on  the  near  side. 

He  was  the  cause  of  the  catastrophe.  That 
was  the  first  thought  that  arose  as  he  heard 
the  dull  sound,  that,  slight  as  she  was,  she 
made  when  coming  down  upon  the  ground 
with  a  crash.  He  was  the  cause ;  on  him  the 
blame  would  rest  had  aught  befallen  her.  Then 
he  sprang  from  his  own  horse  and  picked  her 
up,  and  she  was  not  hurt — not  bruised  and 
marred,  as  he  had  feared  to  find  her. 

The  horse  had  not  done  that  which  had  not 
been  anticipated  of  him  out  of  viciousness.  It 
had  been  prophesied  of  Devilskin  by  the  infal- 
lible Claude,  that  he  would  touch  his  fences — 
buck  them,  in  fact ;  instead  of  which  he  had 


flown  this,  and  thrown  Bella  "  out "  in  her  cal- 
culations, and  off  her  saddle.  But  there  had 
not  been  an  atom  of  vice  or  of  malice  prepense 
in  Devilskin's  mind.  He  had  flown  his  fence 
and  thrown  his  rider,  but  now  he  stood  looking 
down  at  the  result  of  his  unexpected  act  with 
much  mildness  in  his  eyes. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham,  when  she  found 
herself  sloping  away  down  to  the  earth  over 
Devilskin's  near  shoulder,  did  the  wisest  and 
only  thing  to  be  done  under  the  circumstances 
— freed  her  foot  from  the  stirrup,  and  so  far 
ensured  a  clear  fall.  But  she  had  held  on  to 
the  snaffle-rein  so  firmly,  that  it  was  her  elbow, 
instead  of  her  hand  and  wrist,  which  came 
down  upon  the  ground,  and  the  elbow  was 
saved  from  dislocation  through  the  fact  of  the 
snaffle-rein  being  only  just  long  enough  to 
admit  of  her  elbow  coming  into  the  barest  con- 
tact with  the  ground  before  her  whole  body 
was  there  also  to  bear  its  own  weight.  But 
her  hands  got  a  cruel  jerk. 

Jack  picked  her  up,  and  looked  at  her  with 
a  big,  loving  anxiety  in  his  eyes,  and  a  face 
paler  than  her  own. 

"How  on  earth  did  you  do  it?  Are  you 
hurt?"  he  asked,  stammering,  in  his  intense 
impatience  to  question  and  to  hear. 

"No,  I'm  not  hurt  My  arm  is  grazed,  I 
think.  But,  oh !  Jack,  I  wonder  that  not  only 
my  arm,  but  my  neck  too,  isn't  broken !" 

Her  hat  had  fallen  off,  and  had  got  an  inden- 
tation that  might  not  be  rectified  by  unskilful 
hands.  She  looked  at  it  ruefully,  as  he  picked 
it  up,  and  said — 

"  I  seemed  to  be  falling  down  miles  straight 
upon  my  head  to  the  road  that  was  rushing  up 
to  meet  me.  What  did  he  do  ?" 

"He  did  his  part  of  the  business  all  right 
enough,"  Jack  said,  dispassionately,  looking  at 
the  horse.  He  had  conceived  a  great  love  and 
admiration  for  his  sister-in-law,  and  a  vast  pity 
for  her  tangled  and  torn  condition  filled  his 
heart  as  he  stood  there  by  her  side.  But,  for 
all  that,  he  could  not  deem  a  horse  who  had 
flown  a  fence  so  cleverly  deserving  of  aught 
but  praise. 

When  the  hat  had  been  restored  to  something 
more  like  its  original  shape  than  had  been  its 
portion  when  first  they  picked  it  up,  and  some 
of  the  mud  had  been  brushed  from  her  habit, 
Jack  proposed  that  they  should  re-mount  and 
go  home  very  steadily  by  the  road. 

She  put  her  right  hand  on  the  pummel,  and 
raised  the  other  to  his  shoulder,  but  as  soon  as 
she  touched  him,  she  suffered  her  hand  to  fall 
away  down  by  her  side,  with  a  little  cry  of 
pain. 

"What  is  the  matter?"  he  asked  it  with  a 
prompt  and  complete  return  of  the  big,  loving 
anxiety  in  his  eyes,  with  such  tenderness  in  his 
tones,  that  the  tears  glistened  up  between  her 
lashes  in  response. 

"lam  hurt — my  wrist — " 

He  touched  her  hand,  unbuttoning  her  glove, 
and  baring  the  delicately-veined  wrist  with  a 
deft  gentleness  that  was  a  newly-born  thing  in 
Jack. 

"Your  wrist  is  strained!  Don't  cry,  dear 
Bella !  "  he  said,  half  sobbing  himself,  as  she 
heaved,  and  panted,  and  wept,  partly  with  pain, 
and  partly  because  she  was  afraid  Claude  would 


ON  GUARD. 


69 


disapprove  of  the  steps  she  had  taken  unknown 
to  him  to  improve  her  acquaintance  with  the 
locality,  and  strain  her  wrist. 

"  Don't  cry,  dear  Bella !  "  he  repeated,  with 
imploring  eyes  and  tones ;  and  then — he  was 
very  young,  and  true  as  steel,  as  I  have  said — 
he  put  his  arm  round  her,  and  stooped  his 
honest  young  head,  and  kissed  her  on  the 
mouth,  in  attempted  consolation.  It  was  a  ges- 
ture that  was  more  like  the  impulsive,  awkward, 
protecting  fondness  of  a  big  Newfoundland  dog 
than  a  mere  man's  salute.  She  could  not  help 
regarding  it  with  the  same  sort  of  grateful  tole- 
ration she  had  experienced  in  former  days  when 
Rock  had  striven  to  console  her  in  some  sorrow, 
by  nearly  knocking  her  down. 

"  You  dear,  good-natured  boy,  I'm  not  hurt 
much,  and  I  'won't  cry !  "  she  said,  smiling  at 
him  ;  "  give  me  a  hand  up,  and  we'll  go  home 
by  the  road,  as  you  say." 

They  mounted  and  rode  along  in  silence  for 
about  half  a  mile,  when  she  broke  it  by  saying — 

"  Don't  tel"  any  one  about  my  bungling  over 
that  hedge,  as  I  did,  Jack,  or  I  shall  not  be  let 
ride  on  Wednesday." 

"  I  won't,  as  you  wish  mo  not." 

As  he  answered  her,  a  gentleman  and  lady 
rode  past,  and  Bella  recognised  Lord  Lexley. 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

LADY  LEXLEY.  /  ^ 

IT  must  be  confessed  that  Mrs.  Claude  Walsing- 
ham  took  ignominious  precautions  to  gain  in- 
gress to  the  halls  of  her  husband's  fathers  unob- 
served that  day,  on  her  return  from  the  unlucky 
trial  trip  with  Jack  and  Devilskin.  She  was 
shaken  and  very  muddy,  and  she  had  a  keen 
desire  to  keep  these  two  facts  from  the  eyes  of 
the  Markhams.  "  Can  we  not  ride  into  the 
yard,  and  then  can't  I  get  into  the  house  through 
some  side  door,  Jack  ? "  Bella  said  to  him,  in 
the  confidential  tone  that  is  frequently  adopted 
by  women  when  designed  to  fall  upon  very 
young  masculine  ears.  "  Oh  yes ;  but  why  ?  " 
Jack  had  answered ;  and  then  Bella  had  ex- 
plained to  him  that  the  most  casual  glance  from 
the  least  observant  female  eyes  would  be  suffi- 
cient to  enable  the  possessor  of  said  eyes  to 
glean  from  her  (Bella's)  appearance  all  that  she 
most  ardently  desired  should  not  be  gleaned. 

But  there  is  no  such  thing  as  gaining  quiet 
ingress  to  a  country  house  from  the  stable -yard 
regions.  There  were  no  less  than  three  dogs 
chained  up  in  the  yard,  and  these  all  plunged 
cut  of  their  kennels,  and  greeted  her  first  with 
ferocious  barks,  and  presently  with  servile 
whines  and  yells  to  be  let  loose.  The  tramp 
of  the  horses,  and  the  rattling  of  the  chains, 
and  Jack's  cries  of  "  Down,  Rose,  old  girl ! 
What,  Nep !  do  you  want  to  be  loosed  ? " 
brought  heads,  or,  at  least,  a  head,  to  every 
window  from  which  a  glimpse  of  the  most 
remote  portion  of  the  yard  could  be  gained,  and 
while  the  heads  were  at  the  windows  Bella 
would  not  brave  discovery  by  approaching  the 
house  in  her  mud. spattered  habit.  So  she  stood 
away  at  the  extreme  end,  playing  with  Nep- 
tune and  a  couple  of  Jack's  red  setters,  till  her 


feet  got  cold,  and  it  was  opined  by  her  patient 
watchers  that  she  "  seemed  wonderful  fond  of 
Master  Jack,  that  she  did,  letting  them  great, 
big,  ugiy  dogs  of  his  put  their  dirty  paws  on 
her  shoulders." 

Finally  she  went  in  through  a  side  door,  as 
she  had  said  she  would  do,  but  the  splashes  of 
mud  did  not  escape  detection.  In  the  hall,  just 
as  she  was  about  to  flee  up  stairs,  followed  by 
her  own^maid,  she  met  Mrs.  Markham. 

"Wha't  a  dreadful  state  Jack's  dogs  have 
made  you  in,  my  dear  Bella  1  I  hear  you  have 
been  playing  with  them  for  the  last  hour," 
Claude's  eldest  sister  said. 

"More  or  less,"  Bella  replied,  catching  at  the 
excuse  for  her  having  such  a  liberal  portion  of 
the  soil,  about  her,  eagerly.  "  I'm  so  fond  of 
dogs,  you  know,  that  I  never  care  a  bit  what 
they  do  to  me." 

"  Luncheon  is  still  on  the  table ;  won't  you 
come  in  as  you  are  ?" 

"  No,  thank  you ;  I'll  go  first  and  take  off 
my  habit,"  Bella  replied,  colouring  vividly.  She 
was  annoyed  at  being  detained,  and  her  wrist 
was  paining  her. 

"  Oh,  very  well,"  Mrs.  Markham  replied,  stand- 
ing aside  elaborately  to  let  Mrs.  Claude  pass. 
"  You  will  find  Miss  Harper  with  us  when  you 
come  down.  Claude  has  been  in  a  long  time." 

It  is  not  a  nice  thing  to  have  a  sprained 
wrist,  and  to  feel  morally  certain  that  unless 
you  keep  your  sentiments  respecting  it  to  your- 
self, that  condemnation,  instead  of  pity,  will  be 
your  portion  from  the  unsympathetic  masses. 
Bella's  perfect  love  for  Claude  by  no  means  cast 
out  her  fear  of  Claude's  family  developing  un- 
pleasant traits  towards  her  on  the  first  opportu- 
nity. Therefore  she  resolved  upon  making  a 
small  secret  of  the  dilemma  into  which  she  had 
fallen,  through  Devilskin's  change  of  purpose, 
on  account  of  the  mighty  and  most  reasonable 
dread  she  had  of  aught  being  said  which  she 
might  not  like  to  hear. 

She  was  pale  with  the  pain  when  she  reached 
the  dining-room  at  last,  after  laboriously  dress- 
ing, and  striving  (ineffectually)  to  keep  back 
the  swelling  in  her  wrist,  simultaneously.  The 
ruins  of  the  luncheon  were  on  the  table  still, 
and  by  it  was  one  who  had  materially  conduced 
to  this  ruin — a  great,  fair  girl,  with  a  wealth  of 
hair,  and  colour,  and  flesh,  who  was  introduced 
to  the  bride  as  Miss  Harper. 

It  only  speaks  well  for  the  breed,  and  is  by 
no  means  derogatory  to  the  individual,  when  I 
say  that  Miss  Harper  was  the  very  usual  type 
of  big,  blue-eyed  blondes.  You  will  see  one  or 
two,  at  least,  resembling  her,  in  every  ball-room, 
Tall,  with  an  immense  amount  of  back ;  oval 
faced,  yet  inclining  to  be  thick  about  the  jaw ; 
large  limbed,  with  luxuriant  hair  that  was  too 
dark  to  be  called  yellow,  and  too  light  for 
brown  to  be  itd  fitting  appellation;  luxurious 
rather  than  loose  or  even  easy  in  action ;  young, 
healthy,  and  animal,  in  a  quiet,  unobtrusive, 
voluptuous  way  that  a  painter  would  have 
loved  to  look  upon,  it  being  entirely  harmonious 
with  her  beauty,  Grace  Harper  impressed  Mrs. 
Claude  Walsingham  on  the  instant  as  being  a 
well-bred,  well-fed  nonentity. 

"Where  have  you  been,  Bella?"  Claude 
asked.  "  Jack  has  made  a  rambling  statement 
as  to  where  he  took  you." 


70 


ON  GUARD. 


"Mine  will  probably  be  still  more  rambling. 
How  should  I  know  the  names  of  your  roads  ? 
We  tried  three  different  roads ;  and  oh,  Claude, 
I  saw  Lord  Lexley  riding  with  a  lady !" 

Claude  leant  forward  a  little  more  before  he 
replied.  He  was  sitting  lounging  forward  with 
his  arms  on  his  knees,  before  Miss  Harper,  in  a 
.emi-devotional  manner,  that  angered  his  mo- 
ther to  the  full  as  much  as  it  would  have 
pleased  her  in  former  days. 

"That's  his  wife,"  he  said,  when  he"  did  an- 
swer Bella's  remark  relative  to  Lord  Lexley. 

"I  didn't  know  he  was  married.  How 
strange !  "Whom  did  he  marry,  Claude  ?" 

She  asked  it  eagerly.  She  was  naturally  in- 
terested about  the  man  who  had  fancied  him- 
self— and  caused  her  to  fancy  him — in  love 
with  her  once. 

'  "  You  had  better  ask  Miss  Harper ;  he  is  her 
cousin ;  she  can  give  you  full  information — can't 
you  ?"  he  added,  looking  up  at  Miss  Grace  with 
eyes  that  made  her  feel  Mrs.  Claude  to  be  a 
thorn  in  her  flesh. 

"  As  full  information  as  any  stranger  can  care 
to  have,  I  suppose.  Lord  Lexley  married  two 
months  ago.  Lady  Lexley  is  a  delightful  per- 
son ;  not  an  Englishwoman." 

"But  Lord  Lexley  is  not  a  stranger  to  me  by 
any  means,  Miss  Harper.  (No,  Jack,  I  won't 
have  anything  more,  thank  you.  I  don't  like  eat- 
ing by  myself.)  He's  not  a  stranger  to  me,  as 
you  will  find,  if  you  ask  him." 

Mrs.  Claude  was  colouring  and  flashing,  and 
speaking  as  she  was  wont  to  look  and  speak 
when  angry.  Claude  felt  annoyed ;  trifling  as 
the  storm  might  be,  it  would  probably  interfere 
with  his  massive  flirtation  with  Miss  Harper. 

"  You  shouldn't  have  let  Jack  lure  you  away 
so  far  if  you  dislike  eating  by  yourself,  dear," 
he  said  quietly. 

"  We  have  not  been  far." 

"  Then  what  the  deuce — beg  pardon — what 
in  the  world  have  you  been  doing  ?  You  have 
been  out  long  enough.  Was  your  horse  trou- 
blesome ?" 

"Not  a  bit — was  he,  Jack?"  Bella  replied, 
confidently. 

"  Not  a  bit,"  Jack  answered,  with  an  alacrity 
he  had  not  displayed  before.  There  was  truth, 
to  his  mind,  in  the  statement  as  to  the  horse 
not  having  been  troublesome.  The  horse  had 
done  all  which  may  become  a  horse,  all  which 
could  be  expected  of  the  best  known  and  best 
conducted  animal  Jack  rather  hoped  that  the 
conversation  would  not  quit  the  field  of  Devil- 
skin's  worthy  merits.  If  it  did,  and  wandered 
ofif  into  riding  experience  generalities,  and  so 
provoked  further  questioning  and  cross-exami- 
nation as  to  what  had  befallen  Mrs.  Claude  and 
himself  this  morning,  he  would  be  in  a  sore 
strait.  His  newly-born  loyalty  towards  his 
brother's  wife  would  rise  up  in  arms  against 
his  normal  loyalty  towards  the  truth,  and  may- 
be conquer  the  latter,  for  Bella's  charm  had 
worked. 

Mrs.  Claude  had  contented  herself  with  the 
mildest  viands  up  to  this  juncture — contented 
herself  with  viands  to  which  she  did  not  ordi- 
narily incline,  such  as  sweet  soft  puddings  that 
permitted  themselves  to  be  eaten  with  a  spoon. 
Just  now  it  occurred  to  her  to  try  something 
else — something  which  necessitated  the  use  of 


a  fork,  and  as  soon  as  she  took  the  fork  in  her 
hand,  she  gave  a  little  exclamation  and  suffer- 
ed the  fork  to  fall  on  her  plate  with  a  heavy 
clatter. 

Her  strained  wrist  could  be  kept  a  secret  no 
longer ;  she  was  holding  it  away  from  her  with 
her  other  hand,  and  saying,  "  Oh,  how  it's 
swollen  1  what  shall  I  do  ?"  when  Claude 
looked  at  her.  He  ceased  seeking  to  improve 
the  shining  hours  with  Miss  Harper  in  an  in- 
stant, and  went  over  to  his  wife's  side.  - 

"What  is  it?  How  did  this  happen,  dar- 
ling ?  You  are  hurt  ?" 

"  He  was  leaning  over  her  with  a  tenderly- 
protecting  air,  that  almost  made  her  feel  that  it 
would  be  well  to  confide  the  cause  of  this  acci- 
dent to  him.  However,  second  thoughts  arose 
and  checked  her.  It  would  not  be  confiding  it 
alone  to  Claude — that  she  would  have  done  at 
once — but  to  Claude's  family,  who  might  inter- 
fere, on  the  strength  of  this  accident,  and  per- 
suade him  not  to  let  her  have  a  run  with  the 
hounds  on  Wednesday. 

"  My  wrist  got  a  little  jerk,"  she  stammered. 
"  Don't  touch  it  so — take  care,"  she  cried,  as 
Claude  manipulated  the  swollen  wrist. 

"  How  did  it  get  a  little  jerk  ?  the  horse  has 
as  good  a  mouth  as  need  be.  Did  you  get  it 
while  you  were  out  though,  or  after  you  came 
home  ?" 

The  husband  asked  these  questions  gently, 
and  Bella  once  more  felt  disposed  to  make  a 
clean  breast  of  it. 

^'Well,   it  was "   she  began,   and  then 

Mrs.  Markham  interrupted  her  to  say — 

"Most  probably  it  was  the  dogs:  they  are 
such  rough  brutes  that  no  lady  should  venture 
near  them  when  they  are  chained." 

"  If  it  had  been  Devilskin's  doing,  you 
should  never  have  ridden  him  again,"  Claude 
said.  "It  isn't  a  sprain,  though;  it's  only  a 
tendon  that  is  strained  a  little.  Did  old  Nep 
throw  your  hand  up  while  you  were  patting 
him  ?" 

"Yes,"  Bella  answered,  colouring  vividly; 
but  telling  her  story  without  hesitation,  never- 
theless. Then  Claude  carefully  bound  the 
injured  wrist  with  a  broad  piece  of  ribbon,  and, 
greatly  to  Jack's  relief,  the  subject  dropped. 

"  I  got  over  it  well,  considering  all  things. 
It  is  impossible  for  me  to  avoid  blundering,  if  I 
prevaricate  ever  so  little,"  Bella  remarked  to 
her  brother-in-law  that  evening. 

"Why  did  you?" 

"  Why  did  I  what  ?" 

"  Humbug  about  it.  Why  didn't  you  out 
with  it — Claude  couldn't  have  said  anything — 
instead  of  laying  the  fault  on  the  poor  innocent 
dogs?" 

"  The  poor  innocent  dogs  are  and  will  ever 
be  in  happy  ignorance  of  the  evil  that  is  laid  to 
their  charge !" 

"  That  doesn't  make  it  one  bit  the  fairer." 

"  Jack,  I  won't  be  reprimanded  by  you.  I 
look  upon  you  as  my  sworn  ally;  you  mustn't 
turn  against  me,  and  go  over  to  the  enemy,  on 
account  of  that  tiniest  of  white  lies  that  I  told 
about  your  dogs.  It  would  have  been  too 
much  to  have  had  every  one  up  in  arms  against 
my  plan  of  going  out  next  Wednesday." 

"So  it  would,"  Jack  said  frankly.  "Well! 
looked  at  that  way,  perhaps ;  only " 


ON  GUARD. 


71 


"  "What  ?  give  mo  the  benefit  of  these  pro- 
found reflections." 

"  They  are  not  '  profound'— I  know  that  very 
well,"  Jack  said,  rather  hotly.  "  I  only  mean 
that  it's  pluckier  to  tell  the  truth:  you  are 
plucky  enough  too." 

"That  I  am,  in  big  things;  but  I  am  a  very 
coward  in  lacing  fuss.  They  don't  like  me  here, 
Jack;  your  mother  and  Mrs.  Markham  have 
mounted  a  sort  of  cold,  polite  guard  over  me, 
that  I  feel,  though  it's  not  tangible ;  they  would 
be  disposed  to  take  a  severe  view  of  every 
little  misfortune,  horsey  or  otherwise,  that  be- 
fell me." 

"  If  they  found  it  out,  but  not  if  you  said  all 
there  was  to  say  about  it  yourself.  You  will 
after  this,  won't  you — whether  Devilskin  flies 
his  fences  or  not  ?" 

"  Yes,  I  will  after  this,"  she  replied— "I  will 
indeed,  if  you  will  only  keep  this  one  first  little 
experience  quiet." 

Which  Jack  promised  to  do  in  accents  so  firm 
that  Bella  deemed  the  matter  dead  and  buried 
beyond  all  possibility  of  resuscitation. 

Miss  Grace  Harper  was  endowed  by  nature 
with  a  good  memory.  She  was  one  of  those 
people  who  can  remember  and  reproduce  for 
the  edification  of  others  what  she  said  to  him, 
and  he  to  her,  and  what  they  were  both  doing 
at  the  time,  together  with  what  other  people 
appeared  to  think  about  it.  This  last  was  the 
wildest  conjecture ;  but  the  matter  she  conjec- 
tured, taken  in  conjunction  with  her  manner 
of  giving  it  forth,  imparted  that  air  of  truth  and 
reality  to  what  she  said  which  is  apt  to  hover 
over  dull  thoughts  dully  worded.  There  was 
a  vast  appearance  of  sober  reflection  in  the  sen- 
tences in  which  she  accredited  So-and-so  with 
having  thought  such  and  such.  One  forgot  that 
truth  is  beauty  when  listening  to  her  surmises, 
and  only  felt  the  improbability  of  any  one  hav- 
ing the  bad  taste  to  conceive  so  plain  a  fiction. 

Miss  Harper  went  home  from  her  visit  to  the 
Court,  and  her  interview  with  the  heir  and  his 
bride,  not  at  all  indisposed  to  cry  havoc  and  let 
loose  the  dogs  of  war  upon  the  latter.  She  had 
been  carefully  trained  to  love  and  look  up  to 
Claude  Walsingham,  and  she  had  a  good  me- 
mory, and  could  not  forget  that  she  had  been 
so  trained.  She  had  a  great  gift  of  patience, 
and  there  had  been  no  suffering  to  her  in  that 
waiting  for  him  which  his  mother  had  tacitly 
enjoined  of  late  years ;  but  when  the  waiting 
was  proved  inefficacious,  she  began  to  bewail 
herself  in  her  silent  soul,  and  lament  her  lost 
time.  She  felt  injured ;  she  felt  that  Mrs.  Claude 
had  reaped  the  result  for  which  she  (Grace)  had 
not  "striven,"  but  waited.  Therefore,  as  was 
wise  and  womanly,  she  hated  Mrs.  Claude,  and 
marked  a  mighty  mote  in  Mrs.  Claude's  eye. 

She  had  listened  attentively  to  every  word  to 
which  each  member  of  the  Walsingham  family 
had  given  utterance  on  Mrs.  Claude's  return  that 
day  after  luncheon.  She  had  listened  attentively 
to  every  word,  and  she  was  in  her  usual  position 
of  being  able  to  repeat  every  word  with  wordy 
accuracy  should  occasion  for  doing  so  arise. 
According  to  her  wont,  also,  she  had  not  drawn 
any  remarkably  clear  deductions  from  what  she 
had  heard,  but  had  just  suffered  it  to  sink  .into 
her  memory  for  reproduction  on  the  earliest 
opportunity. 


She  found  that  her  cousin,  the  great  relative 
of  her  house,  whose  sins  of  omission  (he  had 
been  guileless  in  act,  and  was  only  guilty  of 
forgetting  smaller  people  than  himself)  had  been 
sedulously  blinked  by  her  whole  family  from  his 
earliest  childhood — she  found,  I  say,  that  her 
great  cousin  Lord  Lexley  and  his  wife  had  been 
back  from  their  ride  for  some  time  when  she 
reached  home.  Lady  Lexley  was  in  her  dress- 
ing-room. Lady  Lexley  had  made  known  be- 
fore retiring  thither  that  she  would  be  glad  to 
see  Miss  Harper  immediately  on  her  return. 

The  Harpers  had  taken  Lady  Lexley  on  trust, 
in  a  measure — more  than  in  a  measure,  indeed 
— they  had  taken  her  completely  arid  entirely 
on  trust.  This  they  had  done,  partly  because 
Lord  Lexley's  social  countenance  was  loved  by 
them  as  the  sun  is  by  its  flower,  and  partly  be- 
cause in  their  hearts  they  did  believe  him  to  be 
incapable  of  folly  or  vice.  Wishing  him  to  con- 
tinue to  shine  upon  them,  they  argued  warmly 
against  nothing — for  no  one  had  to  them 
breathed  a  word  in  disparagement  of  the  new 
Lady  Lexley — argued  that  "if  Lexley  were 
satisfied,  it  would  ill  become  them  to  question 
the  antecedents  of  a  lovely  Italian  countess, 
whose  filial  feelings  had  subjected  her  to  the 
agonies  of  publicity."  So  they  took  her  upon 
trust,  and  gave  her  their  best  rooms,  and  were 
grateful  for  all  the  trouble  she  gave,  as  became 
worthy,  kind  country  people,  who  liked  their 
neighbours  to  see  how  well  they  stood  with  their 
grandest  connection. 

Lady  Lexley  was  very  anxious  to  hear  of 
Claude,  and  she  was  even  more  anxious  to  hear 
of  Claude's  wife.  Lord  Lexley  was  one  of 
those  nice-looking,  cool,  crisp  men,  who  never 
say  clever  things,  but  who  never  do  foolish 
ones  in  everyday  life;  his  marriage  had  not 
been  all  that  was  wise  and  discreet,  perhaps, 
but  it  was  the  exception  to  an  otherwise  unva- 
rying rule.  Lord  Lexley  being  this,  his  wife 
(sbe  was  only  a  woman)  did  sometimes  remem- 
ber that  summer  night  at  Richmond;  and  re- 
membering this,  she  felt  anxious  to  hear  more 
of  Mrs.  Claude. 

Lady  JLexley,  clever,  designing,  well  used  to 
conceal  and  to  affect  as  she  was,  was  a  more 
legible  book  to  the  unsophisticated  country 
girl,  Miss  Harper,  than  was  the  unsophisticated 
country  girl  to  her.  She  had  not  found  out 
that  the  great  "  what  might  be  "  of  Grace's  life 
had  been  her  possible  union  with  the  son  of 
her  father's  most  important  neighbour.  But 
Grace  had  fathomed  that  the  light  which  ne'er 
shall  shine  again  on  life's  dull  stream  for  Lady 
Lexley,  had  been  a  "  something "  which  she 
had  known,  had  felt,  had  looked,  had  sighed 
with,  and  for,  and  in  the  company  of  Claude. 

Grace  Harper  did  not  love  Lady  Lexley  the 
better  for  this  discovery.  No  woman  does 
feel  better  disposed  'towards  the  possibly  fa- 
voured sharer  of  her  feelings  than  towards  the 
rest  of  the  world.  But  she  liked  the  idea 
which  suggested  itself  to  her  of  making 
Lady  Lexley's  hand  administer  a  depreciatory 
pat  on  the  head  of  Claude  Walsingham's 
wife. 

Miss  Harper  told  the  story  of  Mrs.  Claude's 
ride,  and  Mrs.  Claude's  return,  to  Lady  Lexley, 
while  Lady  Lexley  was  being  perfected  and 
prepared  for  the  full  light  of  many  candles 


ON  GUAKD. 


below.  Miss  Harper  told  the  story  in  the 
minute,  careful,  laborious,  truthful-upon-the- 
face-of-it  way  in  which  plump,  lymphatic,  fair 
women  are  apt  to  tell  things  when  a  listener 
is  their  portion.  And  Lady  Lexley  brightened 
through  the  deftly-applied  rouge  as  she  heard, 
and  her  flexible  lips  quivered ! — quivered  even 
under  the  liberal  application  of  Chinese  pink 
— and  her  form,  appeared  to  expand,  and  her 
luscious  dark  eyes  kindled,  and  she  was  all  the 
Queen  of  Song  in  a  lyric  rage  of  excitement, 
instead  of  being  merely  the  well- established 
English  lady,  earnest  only  on  the  one  point  of 
refraining  from  betraying  aught  that  might  be 
used  in  evidence  of  her  ever  having  known 
another  calling. 

"And  this  brother!  what  is  he  like?"  she 
asked,  with  ill-subdued  eagerness,  when  Grace 
had  brought  her  narration  to  a  conclusion. 

"Oh,  Jack?— well,  I  can  hardly  tell  you 
what  Jack  is  like,  really;  quite  a  boy." 

"  Quite  a  boy  is  he  ?  too  young  to  be  deserv- 
ing of  a  description  ?"  Lady  Lexley  said  with 
a  peculiar  little  laugh,  conjuring  up  as  she 
spoke  a  vision  of  a  vaulting  horse,  and  a  falling 
woman,  and  of  a  fair,  flushed,  young,  honest 
face,  bent  on  both  these  things  in  anguish. 

"  Yes,  a  mere  boy,"  Grace  replied.  "  If  you 
ask  men  about  him,  they  will  tell  you  that  he 
is  a  crack  shot,  and  a  first-rate  rider  (daring 
and  judicious,  you  know — they  say  no  one 
rides  straighter  than  Jack  Walsingham),  and 
a  good  cricketer;  but  I  don't  care  for  such 
things.  He  is  not  intellectual,  like  Claude." 

"  I  can  fancy  intellect  appeals  to  you  more 
unfailingly,"  Lady  Lexley  said,  with  what 
would  have  been  a  sneer  had  not  Grace  glanced 
at  her,  but  which,  as  Grace  did  glance  at  her, 
she  changed  at  the  birth  into  a  smile.  "How 
good  and  kind  of  Major  "Walsingham  to  give 
his  brother,  his  young  guileless  brother,  such 
opportunities  of  improvement  in  the  ways  of 
this  wicked  world !  No  one  knows  them  better 
than  Mrs.  Claude,  I  fancy ;  at  any  rate  she  has 
experience." 

"Has  she?'  Grace  asked,  pricking  up  her 
ears.  Lady  Lexley  laughed. 

"Tolerably  extensive  experience,  I  should 
say,  as  would  any  one  else  who  knew  that  she 
was  so  compromised  with  one  of  her  old  lovers, 
that  she  was  obliged  to  agree  in  taking  a  part 
in  the  absurd  farce  into  which  he  turned  her 
wedding.  They  say  she  only  submitted  to  Mr. 
Yillars'  plan  of  tying  the  holy  knot  under  fear 
of  exposure." 

As  she  said  this,  Lady  Lexley  grew  more 
bloomingly  vicious;  and,  despite  the  opaque 
whiteness  of  Miss  Harper's  skin,  a  shade  of 
green  shot  across  her  face. 

"  Oh !  '  exposure  ?'  I  should  doubt  the  possi- 
bility of  that,"  Miss  Harper  remarked,  with  that 
stolid  air  which  is  the  most  wary  of  all  man- 
ners. "  Nothing  could  ever  be  said  about  her, 
I'm  sure ;  she's  too  frank  a  flirt  to  be  a  bad 
one." 

Lady  Lexley  was  deceived  by  the  stolidity, 
deceived  even  to  the  point  of  showing  her 
highest  trump  to  the  unsophisticated  cousin  of 
her  husband. 

"Far  too  frank  a  flirt,  Grace;  far  too  frank 
to  be  let  ride  about  with  that  handsome  booby 
of  a  boy,  even  in  these  secluded  country  lanes." 


"  Oh  1  no ;  Jack  is  quite  a  boy." 

Lady  Lexley  laughed  out,  and  threw  her 
head  up ;  and  the  full  blaze  of  the  lamp  that 
hung  over  her  dressing-table  fell  down  upon 
the  rich  yellow  efflorescence  that  bloomed  upon 
her  face. 

"  Not  too  much  of  a  boy  to  neglect  tasting 
what  lovely  lips  are  near,  whether  they  may 
ever  be  his .  legally  or  not.  '  Quite  a  boy  ! ' 
'  a  mere  boy ! '  What  a  child  you  are  to  sing 
to  so  old  a  nursery  tune  as  that.  /  saw  them 
out  this  morning.  I  saw  her  fall  from  her 
horse,  and  then  he  solaced  the  pain  that  strain- 
ed wrist  caused  her  by  the  tenderest  caresses!" 

"  Did  he  ?  how  very  funny  !"  Grace  said, 
quietly  rising  up,  and  keeping  her  big  blue  eye 
on  the  rich  yellow  efflorescence  the  while.  "I 
must  go  and  dress  now,  dear;  you  will  bo 
ready  for  dinner  so  long  before  me." 

Then  she  went  away  soberly  and  slowly,  as 
she  was  wont  to  go  and  come;  and  Lady 
Lexley  watched,  with  her  head  turned  with  an 
eager,  inquiring  straia  over  her  shoulder,  the 
egress  from  her  room  of  the  girl  to  whom  she 
had  told  her  latest-seasoned  secret.  "  I  wish 
I  had  held  my  tongue,"  Lady  Lexley  said  to 
herself;  "but  she  will  forget  it;  she  is  dull, 
dull,  dull,  as  are  the  loves  of  her  land." 

It  was  the  old  story  over  again  of  the  sharper- 
witted  woman  being  deceived  and  outwitted  by 
the  more  stupid  one,  who  saw,  and  said,  and 
suffered  too  sometimes,  and  still  made  no  sign. 
The  tortoise  is  perpetually  winning  victories 
over  the  hare.  Let  us,  who  are  tortoises,  be 
merry  and  rejoice,  and  hymn  to  the  best  of  our 
ability  the  praises  of  stolidity  and  sober  slow- 
ness. 

"  He  shall  be  sorry  yet  that  he  has  made  me 
wait  all  these  years  for  nothing!"  Grace  Harper 
said  to  herself  while  she  was  dressing.  "I 
wonder  how  he  will  like  hearing  what  Lady 
Lexley  saw,  and  that,  if  /  don't  keep  her  from 
speaking  of  it,  his  wife  will  be  talked  about." 

The  wonder  imparted  an  extraordinary  zest 
to  her  toilet. 


CHAPTER  XXIII. 

FALSE  IMPRESSIONS. 

ON  Tuesday  morning— the  morning  before  that 
day  on  which  the  hounds  were  to  meet  at 
Horsley  Hollow — Mrs.  Claude  broached  the  sub- 
ject of  her  design  of  following  them  to 
her  husband.  "  What  shall  you  go  down 
on,  Claude?"  she  asked — "your  father's  old 
cob  ?" 

"I  shall  not  go  down  'on'  anything;  a  fel- 
low is  one  splash  after  ten  yards  of  these  roads. 
I  shall  have  my  mother's  brougham." 

"  Then  I'll  have  Devilskin  led,  and  go  down 
in  the  brougham  with  you,"  she  said,  in  as  quiet 
a  tone  as  if  she  were  making  the  most  common- 
place arrangement. 

He  looked  up  with  a  quick  wonder.  "  Jack 
will  want  to  go  with  me,"  he  said,  in  a  way 
that  reminded  her  that  there  were  but  two 
seats  in  the  brougham.  \ 

"Jack  is  too  young  to  be  a  sporting  dandy 
yet,  I'm  sure,  Claude ;  he  will  follow  with  just 


ON  GUARD. 


as  light  a  heart  if  he  has  got  splashed  before  the 
hounds  find,  as  if  he's  spotless  till  then  1" 

"But  why  have  Devilskin  led?  What  the 
deuce  is  the  good  of  driving  down  in  your  habit 
to  see  them  throw  off?" 

"I  want  to  keep  free  from  splashes,  too, 
Claude.  I  want  Devilskin  to  be  fresh  when 
we  start,"  she  said,  with  a  little  assumption  of 
defiance  dashed  with  deprecation. 

"  Do  you  want  to  ride  with  us  ?"  he  asked, 
suddenly. 

"Oh,  Claude,  Idol" 

"Well,  I  don't  see  why  JOM  shouldn't,  if  you 
like.  You  know  your  horse  now,  and  Jack 
knows  the  country,  and  can  look  after  you." 

"  You  can  look  after  me  yourself,  Claude." 

"  Certainly,  only  I  am  unacquainted  with  the 
country — comparatively  unacquainted,  that  is 
— however,  you'll  be  all  right.  Why  have 
you  made  such  a  mighty  mystery  of  your  in- 
tention?" 

"  I  didn't  want  it  talked  about." 

"  Does  Jack  know  you  mean  to  ride  ?" 

"Ye — es,"  Bella  said,  hesitatingly. 

•'And  he  has  kept  his  tongue  between  his 
teeth?  That's  wonderful  for  Jack!"  Claude  re- 
marked, carelessly. 

"  I  entreated  him  to  do  so ;  I  felt  convinced 
that  my  plan  would  be  opposed." 

"  Nonsense !     By  whom  ?" 

"  Your  mother  won't  like  it — or  the  Mark- 
hams." 

"Nonsense!  Don't  affect  to  be  a  martyr  to 
old-world  prejudices;  they  interfere  with  you 
very  little,  as  far  as  I  can  see." 

"  Ah !  as  far  as  you  can  see !"  Bella  repeated, 
bitterly. 

"Well,  don't  I  see  far  enough?  My  dear 
Bella,  this  is  childish !  You  imagine  all  sorts 
of  things  that  have  not  the  smallest  foundation 
in  sober  fact,  and  then  you  fancy  yourself  in- 
jured." 

"  I'm  sure  I'm  not  litigious  and  quarrelsome." 

"  There  you  go,  lovely  woman — '  litigious  and 
quarrelsome  !'*  Anything  else  ?  Can't  you  as- 
sure me  that  you  are  not  a  murderous  mis- 
creant, and  that  my  mother  believes  you  one  ?" 

"  Claude,  I  am  not  unjust  to  your  mo- 
ther/' 

"  My  dear  child,  I  know  it ;  nor  is  she  to  you, 
only  you  have  taken  it  into  your  head  that  she 
either  is  or  ought  to  be.  The  fact  is,  you  have 
conceived  parts  for  her  and  yourself,  and  you 
are  determined  to  believe  them  played." 

Mrs.  Claude  clasped  her  hands  more  firmly  as 
they  rested  together  on  her  lap,  and  restrained 
her  desire  to  speak  hard  words. 

"Well,  never  mind,  dear,"  Claude  said,  pre- 
sently; "you  shall  ride  to-morrow,  whatever 
my  mother  and  the  Markhams  say  or  think 
about  it.  "Will  that  content  you?" 

"It  must — I  mean,  of  course,  it  will;  and  I 
am  satisfied  and  delighted,  and  all  sorts  of 
things." 

"  That's  a  pleasant  frame  of  mind ;  I  wish  I 
could  say  the  same  of  myself.  Do  you  know 
we  are  to  be  bored  by  being  carried  off  in  tri- 
umph to  luncheon  at  the  Harpers'  to-day,  to 
meet  Lexley  and  his  wife  ?" 

"  It  won't  be  much  of  a  bore ;  I  shall  not  in 
the  least  mind  going,"  Bella  replied,  with  a 
prompt  amiability  that  arose  from  that  craving 


for  change  which  is  apt  to  come  over  the  spirit 
of  a  temporary  denizen  in  a  country  house. 

"I  thought  you  would  hardly  care  to  go  so 
far  for  so  little  as  luncheon  and  Lexley,"  Major 
Walsingham  observed,  rather  sulkily.  "  Odd  it 
is — devilish  odd — to  see  how  eagerly  women 
grab  at  everything  that  promises  the  meagrest 
excitement!" 

"  Are  you  not  going  ?  would  you  rather  stay 
at  home,  Claude?"  she  asked,  bending  her 
brows  upon  him,  and  suffering  a  line  that  a  foe 
might  have  termed  a  frown  to  come  across  her 
forehead. 

"  Oh,  yes ;  I  am  going  I  that  is,  I  suppose  I 
shall  not  be  let  off  if  my  mother  and  you  go. 
Curse  these  country  hospitalities !  Why  to  God 
can't  they  let  a  fellow  enjoy  the  brief  peace  that 
might  be  his  when  he  has  time  to  come  down 
to  these  places!" 

"  Then,  if  you're  going,  why  should  I  stay  at 
home  ?  I  may  wish  to  cultivate  Miss  Harper, 
for  aught  you  know — or  to  see  Lord  Lexley 
under  altered  circumstances." 

She  laughed  as  she  said  this,  and  Claude  got 
a  bit  of  his  moustache  between  his  teeth,  and 
gnawed  it. 

"I  have  no  doubt  but  that  you  do  want  to 
see  Lord  Lexley:  you  have  a  sort  of  yearning 
to  look  upon  the  joys  you  have  lost,  I  suppose  ? 
Just  fancy! — you  might  have  been  Lady  Lex- 
ley,  had  you  played- your  cards  properly,  instead 
of  being  only  Mrs.  Walsingham  1" 

"  Played  my  cards  properly?  How  can  you 
speak  in  such  a  way,  Claude? — as  if  I  had 
been  hacked,  and  hawked,  and  offered  about ! 
You're  partly  right  though  in  what  you  said, 
though  you  didn't  mean  it: — I  might  have  been 
Lady  Lexley." 

"  My  dear  Bella,  really  this  confidence  is 
most  uncalled  for !  I  thought  you  held  that 
there  was  something  unseemly,  not  to  say  un- 
womanly, in  giving  fortji  the  name  of  a  man 
who  has  been  refused  by  you,  with  a  flourish 
of  trumpets." 

"  Now,  Claude ! — but  I  won't  argue  with 
you,  for  you're  cross  and  unreasonable  about 
something !" 

Major  Walsingham  knew  that  the  charge 
was  just.  He  was  cross  and  unreasonable, 
and  he  felt  that  the  cause  of  such  crossness 
and  unreasoning  ill-temper  might  not  be  given 
publicity.  He  was  annoyed  with  his  wife  for 
her  determination  (all  unconscious  as  she  was) 
to  go  and  witness  the  first  post-nuptial  meeting 
between  Lady  Lexley  and  himself;  and  he  was 
annoyed  with  himself  for  caring  to  meet  Lady. 
Lexley  at  all.  This  latter  annoyance,  however, 
was  swamped  in  the  former  one. 

"Do  you  care  much  about  seeing  more  of 
Gracie  Harper  ?"  he  asked,  after  a  time. 

11  Not  a  bit,  in  reality ;  I  think  her  an  unin- 
teresting noodle." 

"  That  is  a  very  lady-like  expression,  upon 
my  soul !" 

"Oh,  Claude,  do  you  really  correct  me  for 
such  a  trifle  ?  I  wouldn't  have  said  it  before 
any  one  else,  dear,  however  much  I  might  have 
thought  it." 

"  I  should  hope  not,  indeed." 

"Don't  you  agree  with  the  matter,  though 
tho  manner  may  be  offensive  to  you,  Claude  ?" 

"No;  I  do  not.    She  is  not  sharo  and  she 


ON  GUARD. 


is  not  that  worst  of  all  feminine  mistakes — a 
sayer  of  would-be-sensible  things ;  she  puts  out 
the  ideas  God  has  gifted  her  with,  in  little, 
simple  words,  that  you  feel  you  need  not  listen 
to  unless  you  like." 

"  God  has  gifted  her  with  uncommonly  few, 
according  to  my  judgment.  I  wonder  if  you 
so  prefer  a  fool,  that  you  didn't  marry  one, 
Claude  ?" 

"  I  might  say  something  very  invidious,  if  I 
pleased  now,"  he  replied,  lounging  up,  and 
leaning  his  back  upon  the  mantelpiece,  and 
looking  down  on  the  flushed  face  of  his  young 
wife. 

"Ah!  but  it  won't  please  you  to  say  it: — 
don't  say  it  even  if  you  think  it,"  she  cried, 
quickly  springing  up,  and  putting  her  arms 
round  his  neck.  "Just  think,  Claude  —  I 
haven't  been  your  wife  six  months  yet,  and 
I'm  alone  with  you  here  amongst  your  friends, 
who  don't  like  me  too  well.  Don't  say  it." 

"  Nor  do  I  think  it,  my  darling  —  my 
darling !"  he  said,  with  a  complete  return  to  the 
old  tones  and  old  winning  ways  that  had  ap- 
pealed to  her  with  such  thrilling  force  when 
they  ought  not  to  have  so  appealed,  at  which 
Mrs.  Claude  was  intensely  comforted. 

Comforted  to  the  degree  of  enlarging  to  her 
husband  upon  her  intentions  to-morrow.  "I 
shall  have  the  third  crutch  in,  Claude,"  she 
said. 

"What  for?  Doesn't  he  give  you  pull 
enough  when  he  trots?  I  dislike  your  using 
that  third  crutch." 

"  I  didn't  require  it  for  his  trot  at  all." 

"What  do  you  require  it  for?  It  is  so  un- 
safe in  my  opinion ;  pins  you  in  completely." 

"It  will  prevent  my  being  shaken  forward 
when  he  is  going  over  anything." 

"  But  you  can't  go  forward ;  how  should  you 
go  forward  if  you  have  a  commonly  decent  seat, 
as  I  believe  you  to  have  ?  I  am  not  going  to 
have  you  attempting  a  five-barred  gate ;  and  as 
to  fences,  he  just  jumps  on  to  the  bank  and 
then  jumps  down  the  other  side  in  a  way  that 
wouldn't  shake  an  infant  in  the  saddle." 

"  He  might  fly  a  fence  by  mistake,  Claude." 

"Preposterous  nonsense  1  Don't  have  the 
third  pummel,  dear." 

"  Very  well,  I  won't,"  she  said ;  "  I  am  so 
glad  you  see  nothing  against  my  having  the 
treat  of  a  run  with  Markham's  hounds,  Claude." 

Then  he  assured  her  with  a  big  air  of  magna- 
nimity that  he  did  not  see  anything  against  it, 
"  if  she  would  promise  to  be  careful,  and  to  rely 
upon  Jack."  Which  Bella  promised. 

The  luncheon  to  which  the  Walsinghams 
were  invited,  in  the  friendly  unceremonious 
way  indicated  by  the  manner  of  Claude's  men- 
tion of  it  to  his  wife,  was  in  reality  a  well- 
matured  plan.  Mrs.  Harper  had  inclined  kindly 
to  the  idea,  which  she  entertained  in  secret  in 
her  own  mind  for  many  days,  before  any  one 
else  spoke  of  it.  Suddenly  the  gates  of  speech 
were  opened,  and  both  her  daughter  and  Lady 
Lexley  put  the  thing  before  her,  as  to  be  done. 
Accordingly,  she  contemplated  it  kindly  for  an- 
other day  or  two,  and  then  did  it,  or,  at  any 
rate,  put  it  in  training  by  inviting  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Walsingham,  and  such  of  their  friends  then  at 
the  Court  as  liked  to  come. 

When    the  day  came,   Lady  Lexley  com- 


menced her  preparations  towards  that  reception 
of  Claude  Walsirigham's  young  wife  which  it 
was  well  his  old  friends  should  offer  her.  In 
the  first  place,  she  refused  to  go  out  for  a  drive 
with  Grace.  Grace's  opaque  skin  could  stand 
the  biting  March  air  and  wind.  Her  own  sus- 
ceptible epidermis  could  not,  and  she  knew  it. 
She  had  no  intention  of  being  spotted  crimson 
and  yellowish  white  in  the  wrong  places,  on 
tho  occasion  of  her  first  interview  with  Mrs. 
Claude  Walsingham. 

Lady  Lexley  had  a  good  surface  to  work 
upon,  and  capital  outlines  to  fill  in.  As  a  rough 
sketch  from  the  hand  of  nature  early  in  the 
morning,  she  was  very  striking.  You  would 
have  said  so,  had  she  individually  permitted 
you  a  glimpse.  Later  in  the  day  (when  she 
had  an  object  in  view)  she  was  charming  as  a 
work  of  art. 

What  she  did  to  herself  she  did  well.  She 
never  looked  fluffy !  You  had  to  glance  very 
much  athwart  her  skin  in  order  to  detect  the 
bloom  that  God  had  had  less  to  do  with  than 
Piesse  and  Lubin.  And  though  (late  in  the 
day)  her  eyes  were  not  so  much  "  put  in  "  as 
brought  out  "  with  a  dirty  finger,"  the  under 
lids  never  looked  bruised,  as  is  the  habit  of  arti- 
ficially darkened  eyes  usually. 

In  fact,  she  was  an  artist  who  had  never 
wasted  her  powers  on  any  canvas  save  herself. 
This  being  the  case,  the  surface  was,  at  the 
time  of  our  making  her  acquaintance,  in  excel- 
lent order :  it  was  so  thoroughly  well  mellowed 
that  it  would  "take"  the  smallest  and  most 
delicate  hues  and  touches. 

Lady  Lexley  was  down  in  the  dining-room 
at  two  o'clock  that  day,  standing  about  waiting 
for  the  people  from  the  Court,  with  the  rest  of 
the  Harper  family  and  her  husband.  This  lat- 
ter never  looked  out  of  place  in  the  house  in 
the  country  in  the  daytime,  as  the  majority  of 
men,  Englishmen  at  least,  do  in  the  shooting 
and  hunting  seasons.  He  looked  fair,  cool,  and 
crisp,  as  it  was  usual  with  him  to  look  exter- 
nally. Inside,  he  was  in  a  rose-blush  of  satis- 
faction, and  a  delicate  tremor  of  delight  at  see- 
ing how  well  his  wife  would  look  before  the 
woman  who  had  refused  him. 

They  came :  Mrs.  Claude  a  trifle  wearied  by 
the  drive,  but  supported  wonderfully  by  the 
prospect  of  to-morrow,  and  Major  Walsingham 
rather  curious  and  rather  dubious  about  the 
meeting  between  Lady  Lexley  and  his  wife. 
"I  shall  tell  off  that  good-natured  Gracie  to 
Bella  for  the  day,"  he  thought;  "  she  is  stupid, 
but  she  has  no  sting." 

But  he  was  not  suffered  to  carry  out  his  idea, 
though  Lady  Lexley  was  as  well  inclined  to  the 
plan,  which  would  have  left  her  free  to  fan  the 
flame  of  the  fancy  of  the  man  who  had  liked  her 
once,  as  was  that  man  himself.  Claude  was 
clever,  and  Lady  Lexley  was  adroit,  but  Grace 
Harper's  stolidity  defeated  them  both,  without 
either  being  conscious  that  she  was  the  defeat- 
ing cause. 

On  their  arrival  Claude  had  been  somewhat 
impressive  in  his  manner  of  introducing  his  wife 
to  his  old  acquaintance,  Lady  Lexley.  He  had 
prepared  Bella  for  it  in  a  measure,  and  had  as- 
signed a  mean  motive  for  doing  so.  "  For  God's 
sake,  don't  be  distant  or  constrained  in  your 
manner  towards  Lexley's  wife,  or  she'll  think 


ON  GUARD. 


you  are  so  because  you  lost  him  yourself, 
Bella,"  he  had  said;  and  when  Bella  had  de- 
fended herself  from  the  imputation  of  such 
manner  ever  being  hers,  he  had  made  it  a  par- 
ticular'request  that  it  should  not  be  so,  at  any 
rate,  or  any  cost  of  trouble,  in  this  instance. 

Mrs.  Claude  had  promised  promptly  to  com- 
ply with  this  request  on  its  being  made — had 
promised  promptly,  and  without  the  faintest 
tinge  of  suspicion  shadowing  her  mind.  As  the 
carriage  rolled  on,  however,  and  Claude  kept 
his  mother  and  Mrs.  Markham  company  in  a 
sombre  silence,  Mrs.  Claude  began  to  turn  the 
subject  over  and  over,  and  look  at  it  in  every 
possible  light.  After  a  time  she  fancied  that  an 
elucidatory  ray  fell  upon  it.  Claude  had  known 
Lady  Lexley  before !  Who  could  tell  but  that 
Claude  had  loved  her  before,  and  had  lost  her 
to  Lord  Lexley,  even  as  Stanley  Villars  had 
lost  her  (Bella)  to  Claude !  Well,  no  good  could 
accrue  from  speaking  of  it,  or  from  endeavour- 
ing to  find  out  what  had  been ;  but  she  would 
be  on  guard  against  Lady  Lexley ;  on  that  she 
was  resolved. 

Feeling  thus  distrustful  and  jealous  of  Lady 
Lexley,  it  was  only  natural  that  Bella  should 
essay  to  throw  observers  off  the  scent  of  such 
sentiments  being  hers,  by  devoting  her  atten- 
tion almost  exclusively  to  her  ladyship;  thus 
leaving  Claude  to  fall  a  prey  to  dulness  "and 
Miss  Grade.  Mrs.  Claude  simulated  pleasure 
at  making  the  acquaintance  so  prettily,  that 
Lady  Lexley,  who  was  good-natured  and  well- 
disposed  to  so  much  of  the  world  as  did  not 
appear  likely  to  become  a  stumbling-block  to 
her  in  any  way,  liked  her,  and  felt  almost  sorry 
that  the  lapse  from  propriety  which  she  had 
witnessed  when  Devilskin  flew  his  fence  down 
by  Horsley  Hollow,  should  have  been  recount- 
ed by  her  to  Miss  Harper.  Not  that  Lady 
Lexley  deemed  Grace  capable  of  meanly  ani- 
madverting in  an  ill-natured  spirit  on  the  little 
occurrence  to  either  friend  or  foe  of  Mrs. 
Claude's.  She  only  felt  sorry  now  that  she 
should  have,  to  one  who  was- soberly  correct 
and  proper  in  all  things  as  was  Grace,  said 
aught  derogatory  to  the  more  impulsive  woman, 
who  was  far  more  fascinating,  and  far  less  (pro- 
bably) proper  a^,d  correct. 

In  fact,  since  Lady  Lexley  had  achieved  such 
a  much  more  decent  destiny  than  her  wildest 
hopes  had  ever  led  her  to  believe  she  should 
attain,  she  had  become  tolerant  and  tender  to 
very  many  things.  She  had  been  dancing  on  a 
moral  tight-rope  for  any  number  of  years,  and 
it  was  jusfc  an  even  chance,  till  the  other  day, 
whether  she  should  remain  aloft,  or  come  down 
with  damning  violence  into  the  mud.  Now 
danger  was  over,  and  she  was  very  safe.  With 
the  full  knowledge  of  her  own  safety,  there 
came  upon  her  a  good  deal  of  loving-kindness 
towards  those  who  might  need  it,  which  in  former 
days  she  would  have  thought  too  unremunera- 
tive  a  quality  to  indulge  in.  She  was  prepared 
to  be  very  tolerant  indeed  to  Claude  Walsing- 
ham's  wife.  Her  sole  mistake  consisted  in  her 
belief  that  Claude's  wife  stood  in  need  of  such 
toleration. 

So  she  responded  to  the  advances  Bella 
forced  herself  to  make  in  a  way  that  gave  Mrs. 
Claude  a  rare  idea  of  her  duplicity.  "She 
doesn't  like  me— of  course  she  does  not,"  Bella 


thought,  though  why  "  of  course,"  she  would 
have  found  it  hard  to  say.  Bella  had  only  sur- 
mised that  Lady  Lexley  had  been  loved  by 
Claude  in  the  long  ago,  before  he  had  come  to 
Denham.  Out  of  this  surmise  grew  another, 
viz.,  that  now  Lady  Lexley  was  jealous  of  and 
did  not  like  her.  And  this  second  surmise 
strengthened  the  first;  gave  it  bone  and  sub- 
stance, in  the  usual  inconsequent  feminine 
manner. 

After  the  luncheon  was  over  there  was  a 
conservatory  to  be  looked  at — a  conservatory 
that  caused  you  to  stagger  with  surprise  when 
your  vision  first  fell  upon  it.  God's  beautiful 
flowers  may  be  grouped  together  inartistically 
very  often,  but  this  generally  occurs  when  they 
are  gathered  and  put  into  vases  where  those 
blooms  droop  that  should  stand  erect,  and  those 
stand  erect  which  should  droop.  It  is  very 
rarely  that  they  look  hopelessly  vulgar  when 
they  grow,  especially  in  the  country. 

But  they  did  look  so  here.  They  were  about 
in  large  pots  that  wished  to  be  considered  ma- 
jolica, and  were  not — in  pots  that  it  was  «vi- 
dent  were  not  there  for  the  flowers,  but  that 
betrayed  an  oppressive  consciousness  that  the 
flowers  were  there  for  them.  It  was  an  orderly 
conservatory — a  conservatory  with  a  pot  and  a 
plaster-cast  placed  around  it  in  odious  uniformi- 
ty ;  with  a  lot  of  looking-glass  in  it  also,  as  was 
meet  and  right  and  well,  and  an  unfortunate  air 
of  being  all  ready  prepared  for  the  advent  of  a 
solemn-faced  man,  in  seedy  black  and  spacious 
collars,  who  would  favour  the  company  with  a 
comic  song,  or  of  a  young  lady  in  white,  who 
would  warble  something  dubious,  more  dubious 
ly  still.  It  was  a  small  bit  of  Cremorne  by 
daylight,,  in  fact,  this  combination  of  art  and 
nature  which  the  Harpers'  wealth  had  effected 
down  at  their  west  country  family  seat. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  walked  through  this 
conservatory,  avoiding  a  votary  of  Terpsichore 
who  was  bounding  forward  on  the  extreme  tip 
of  a  lamentable  slender  foot,  with  a  candle  sup- 
port in  her  hand,  on  the  one  side,  and  a  bowl 
of  bloated  gold  fish  on  the  other — walked 
through  with  an  elaborate  air  of  "  not  wishing 
for  any  one's  attention,  thank  you,"  and  being 
perfectly  satisfied  that  Claude  should  talk  to  Lady 
Lexley.  Which  manner  was  not  lost  upon  La- 
dy Lexley,  who  pitied  the  feeling  that  engender- 
ed it,  and  with  mistaken  mercifulness  kept  her 
brilliant  self  closely  to  Bella's  side,  leaving 
Claude  to  founder  on  the  big,  fair  rock  on  which 
his  mother  and  himself  had  nearly  split. 

Tho  big,  fair  rock — in  other  words,  the  usu- 
ally stolid  Miss  Harper — was  happier  than  the 
rest  of  the  party,  in  that  she  appeared  to  have 
something  to  say  to  the  one  with  whom  her  lot 
was  currently  cast.  She  was  talking — really 
talking — not  with  animation,  or  rather  not  with 
what  would  have  been  called  animation  in  ano- 
ther woman,  but  with  what  almost  deserved 
to  be  called  so  in  her  case,  in  comparison  with 
her  normal  manners.  She  was  making  a  series 
of  coherent  remarks  apparently,  and  "what 
on  earth  about!"  Bella  thought,  despairingly, 
as  she  felt  keenly  her  own  inability  to  originate 
an  idea  that  should  not  die  and  leave  her  con- 
versationally weaker  than  before,  the  moment 
it  was  born. 

Not.  only  was  there  a  severe  physical  strain 


7(5 


on  Mrs.  Claude  in  getting  through  that  con- 
servatory, but  there  was  a  severe  mental  one 
also.  Not  only  had  she  to  serpentine,  in  a 
graceful  but  fatiguing  way,  through  the  mazes 
of  the  pots,  and  bowls,  and  statues,  but  she  had 
to  think  perpetually  of  something  to  say  that 
would  not  bear,  ever  so  remotely,  on  what 
might  have  been  in  days  of  yore  between 
Claude  and  Lady  Lexley.  She  sought  infor- 
mation laboriously.  With  the  best  intention  in 
the  world,  she  bored  Lady  Lexley  to  tell  her 
the  name  of  every  stick  and  every  leaf  that 
emanated  from  the  mighty  pots.  And  though 
Lady  Lexley  was  bored  at  being  questioned, 
not  alone  about  what  did  not  interest  her,  but 
what  (far  more  damping  reflection!)  did  not 
interest  the  questioner,  she  strove  to  respond, 
strove  to  be  hearty  and  sympathetic  and  genial 
to  this  young  wife,  Vho  showed  so  freely  to 
friends  and  foes  what  she  felt  and  thought  and 
suffered. 

But  they  were  all  very  glad  when  the  inves- 
tigation of  the  small  bit  of  Cremorne  by  day- 
light had  come  to  a  conclusion. 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 

A  THORNY  PATH. 

STANLEY  VILLARS  was  not  the  man  to  go  to 
the  dogs  decorously  in  full  canonicals.  He  had 
lost  his  hope  in  all  things — he  had  lost  his  trust 
and  faith  in  all  things,  since  that  day  when  Bella 
had  stood  and  listened,  passively  apparently,  to 
the  false  words,  with  a  falser  meaning,  when 
falling  from  his  lips,  which  he  was  tacitly  suf- 
fering people  to  suppose  he  held  to  be  uttered 
through  himself  "by  the  grace  of  God."  As 
soon  as  he  lost  his  hope  and  faith,  he  threw  off 
the  cloak  which  many  continue  judiciously  to 
wear  in  order  to  conceal  such  loss,  and  quitted 
the  Church. 

"VVe  saw  him  last  on  that  ruddy  October  morn, 
when  the  friend  of  his  youth  took  from  him  the 
woman  he  loved.  We  meet  him  again  on  a 
bright  March  day,  the  day  after  the  meet  down 
at  Horsley  Hollow,  of  which  frequent  mention 
has  been  made. 

He  had  given  up  his  calling,  he  had  quitted 
his  profession;  in  their  horrified  hearts  his 
family  believed  that  he  had  abjured  his  faith. 
On  this  latter  point  he  was  silent  to  them; 
there  would  have  been  no  pleasure  to  him,  no 
good  gained,  in  showing  them  how  utterly  his 
rock  had  crumbled,  and  so  causing  them  to  feel 
that,  as  they  were  but  human,  so  theirs  might 
crumble  too. 

In  giving  up  his  calling,  in  drifting  out  of  the 
executive  part  of  that  Church,  in  the  letter  or 
the  spirit  of  whose  services  he  could  no  longer 
take  a  part,  he  had  given  up  (and  he  knew  it 
well)  everything.  The  black  coat  and  white 
cravat  cling  like  a  stigma  to  a  man  in  such  a 
case,  honourable  as  they  were  formerly.  Lite- 
rally he  could  cast  them  off,  figuratively  they 
clung  to  him.  and  checked  the  possibility  of 
another  professional  career. 

On  this  bright  March  day  on  which  I  reintro- 
duce  him,  he  was  sitting  in  a  room  into  which 
its  brightness  could  not  penetrate,  by  reason  of 


the  heavy  curtain  of  dust  which  clung  to  the 
window.  A  disconsolate  room,  though  it  was 
neither  a  small  nor  a  badly  furnished  one — a 
terribly  disconsolate  room,  with  that  compound 
air  of  utter  neglect  and  laborious  work  about  it 
which  is  always  depressing. 

The  room  was  the  first-floor  front  of  a  large 
lodging-house  in  a  west-central  street.  "A 
house  that  was  three  minutes  walk  from  Oxford 
Street,  two  minutes  ditto  from  the  Strand,  and 
within  an  easy  distance  from  the  Bank,"  accord- 
ing to  the  advertisement,  which  embodied  the 
sentiments  of  that  great  majority  who  regard 
Oxford  Street,  the  Strand,  and  the  Bank,  as  the 
great  goals  to  be  gained.  There  hung  over  all 
things  a  strong  odour  of  smoke,  and,  littered 
about  on  the  table,  on  sundry  chairs,  and  even 
on  the  floor  at  his  feet,  there  were  lying  a  mul- 
tiplicity of  tale-telling  slips. 

Stanley  Villars  sat  by  the  table  writing.  We 
saw  him  writing  once  before,  if  you  remember  ? 
down  in  his  Denham  study,  at  his  gentleman- 
like scholarly  ease,  before  he  had  outraged  his 
family  by  flinging  free  of  what  he  had  come  to 
consider  his  fetters.  Since  then  he  had  outrag- 
ed his  family ;  and  being  only  a  younger  son, 
and  too  proud  a  man  to  take  aught  that  was 
not  freely  offered,  he  was  now  writing  for  dear 
life. 

His  losses  had  come  upon  him  with  a  despe- 
rate, unrelenting  force  and  haste.  Soon  after 
he  had  lost  Bella  Vane,  and  with  her  his  hope 
and  faith  and  youth,  his  mother  died,  and  her 
death  left  him  poor  indeed. 

There  was  no  home  for  him  in  his  brother'^ 
house.  Gerald  himself  was  kind  and  brotherl} 
enough ;  but  Gerald's  wife  was  as  hard  as  onty 
a  woman  can  be.  She  could  not  forget  ho\v 
sickly  her  child,  the  little  heir,  was.  She  could 
but  think  the  worst  of  the  man  who  stood  next 
in  succession.  He  was  a  hateful  thing  in  her 
eyes,  now  that  he  was  professionless  and  poor, 
and  to  be  put  upon  with  impunity. 

There  had  been  anger  (this  was  one  of  the 
sharpest  stabs  that  were  given  him)  in  his 
mother's  heart  when  he  first  renounced  all  that 
that  high  Tory  and  thorough  church-going  heart 
held  dear.  The  son  she  loved  best  appeared 
bent  upon  going  to  perdition  in  the  most  unor- 
thodox way.  It  made  her  ill  and  angry  when 
first  she  knew  that  he  had  given  up  his  profes- 
sion, and  the  prospect  of  a  fat  living  that  a 
friend  of  hers  had  promised  in  secrecy  "  should 
be  Stanley's,  when  Stanley  could  take  it." 

It  made  her  ill  and  angry,  and,  worse  still,  it 
caused  her  to  alter  her  will. 

Great  consolation,  to  be  given  surviving 
friends  after  her  demise,  in  the  shape  of  well- 
proportioned  legacies,  it  was  not  in  her  power 
to  provide,  for  Lady  Yillars  had  for  the  last 
three  or  four  years  lived  but  to  marry  her 
daughters — an  expensive  motive  which  had 
rewarded  itself  in  Georgina's  case.  Still  she 
had  designed  a  certain  sum  for  Stanley ;  but  on 
Stanley  electing  to  kick  over  the  traces  of  the 
harness  in  which  she  had  willed  he  should 
wend  his  way  to  heaven,  the  Christian  con- 
quered the  mother,  and  she  made  over  the  sum 
in  equal  portions  to  her  two  daughters. 

It  had  been  but  trifling  —  not  enough  to 
make  or  mar  him — still  it  marked  sufficiently 
to  pain  him  what  his  mother  had  felt,  even  if 


ON  GUARD. 


she  had  felt  it  but  for  a  brief  space.  It  marked 
a  certain  difference  in  his  sisters  also.  Georgina 
took  hers,  or  rather  Mr.  Manners  did  for  her, 
with  an  effusive  woe  for  the  cause  of  the  change 
that  made  him  regret,  less  than  he  did  pre- 
viously, his  scanty  prospect  of  meeting  with 
them  in  the  celestial  regions  for  which  Manners 
and  the  rest  of  that  ilk  regarded  themselves  as 
booked 

But  Florence  had  been  what  he  had  always 
known  she  would  be  when  tried — true,  and 
lovingly  generous,  and  gentle  to  him,  and  pain- 
ed far,  far  more  at  the  preference  shown  to  her 
than  he  was  himself. 

Florence  wanted  him  to  take  all  she  had,  and 
"let  her  go  and  live  with  him"  anywhere,  any 
way  in  which  it  might  please  him  to  live.  But 
his  honour  negatived  this  as  sternly  as  did  his 
brother's  wife,  when  she  heard  of  Florence's 
rash  proposition. 

"People  don't  think  the  better  of  you,  Stan- 
ley, for  leaving  the  Church  in  the  way  you 
have ;  that's  only  natural,  even  you  must  allow. 
Where  would  Florence  be,  if  you  took  her 
away  ?"  Lady  Yillars  had  said  to  him. 

"  Where,  indeed !"  he  replied;  "you're  quite 
right,  Carrie;  my  leaving  the  Church,  as 
you  say,  is  worse  than  a  crime,  it's  a  folly. 
Now  if  I  had  left  it  for  something  better,  it 
would  have  been  all  right ;  but  for  nothing ! 
—only  because  I  couldn't  live  a  lie ! — it  must 
strike  the  better  portion  of  the  world  as 
idiotic." 

"You  are  quite  right,  it  does,"  Lady  Villars 
replied,  coldly.  "Florence  is  still  to  be  married, 
remember,  and  men  don't  care  to  invest  in  a 
wife  with  as  few  religious  principles  as  she  has 
thousands ;  you  would  compromise  Florence  hi 
our  set  now." 

This  had  been  quite  enough  to  determine 
Stanley  Yillars.  Hard  and  cruel  as  it  seemed, 
awfully  as  it  sounded,  he  knew  that  it  was  true, 
or  at  any  rate  that  it  would  be  truth  to  those 
whom  Lady  Villars  called  "  our  set."  So  he 
wiped  off  the  last  bloom  that  was  left  to  him  in 
life,  and  drew  a  broad,  hard,  black  line  between 
himself  and  the  sister  who  loved  him. 

She,  Florence,  was  very  miserable  at  parting 
with  him,  and  very  helpless.  The  helplessness 
carried  the  day,  and  they  were  parted. 

Sir  Gerald  Yillars  offered  him  "  his  interest " 
and  an  income — an  income  larger  than  Stanley's 
deserts,  perhaps,  but  smaller  than  his  brother's 
love  for  him.  Stanley  refused  both.  "  Let  me 
go  my  own  way,  for  God's  sake !"  he  said,  after 
his  mother's  funeral;  "it's  no  use  telling  you 
what  I  am  feeling,  but  if  you  don't  let  me  go 
and  feel  it  out  by  myself,  old  boy,  I  shall  go 
mad!  " 

Other  careers  were  closed  to  him,  and  "  men 
must  work,"  or,  rather,  they  must  live.  This  is 
the  sole  excuse  that  can  be  offered  for  Stanley 
Yillars  casting  himself  adrift  on  the  wide  trea- 
cherous ocean  of  daily,  hebdomadal,  and  other 
literature. 

His  early  experiences  on  this  ocean  were  not 
nice !  Whose  are  ?  Still,  bitter  as  they  were, 
they  were  better  than  the  necessity  of  evincing 
gratitude  which  he  did  not  feel  to  outraged 
relatives  and  injured  friends.  His  troubles,  his 
disappointments,  his  time,  his  normal  misery, 
his  chronic  excitement,  the  paltry  sums  these 


things  gained  for  him— they  were  all  his  own 
— all,  utterly,  entirely  his  own ! 

I  have  told  how — back  in  the  old  Denham 
days — he  wrote  grammatical  dulnesses  fo, 
journals  that  had  such  big  names  on  their 
respective  staffs  that  remuneration  might  not 
be  mentioned.  Well,  those  journals-  dropped 
him  now  that  he  really  wanted  them,  for  which 
prudential  move  he  admired  them  immensely, 
as  being  on  a  par  with  their  age — a  fact  their 
staff  of  savans,  and  dulness  generally,  had  in- 
duced him  to  doubt  before. 

So  to  him,  at  last,  there  came  a  day  in  which 
he,  too>  bowed  to  the  great  galling  necessity  of 
sitting  down  to  write  what  would  sell.  He  was 
living  like  a  gentleman  in  chambers  in  the  Tem- 
ple when  he  first  took  to  the  trade, — it  was 
before  he  had  made  the  discovery  that  money, 
like  happiness,  is  a  very  fleeting  thing, — and 
had  come  down  to  the  grimy  room,  in  the  gaunt 
house,  in  the  grim  street,  in  the  west  central 
district. 

He  did  not  fall  upon  the  awful  evil  of  second- 
rate  daily  press  work  all  at  once.  He  came 
upon  that  by  gradations — those  ruinous,  flat- 
tering, exciting  gradations  by  which  men  do 
come  to  it.  The  boat  in  which  he  placed  him- 
self when  first  embarking  upon  the  literary 
ocean  was  a  monthly  magazine  with  a  good 
name.  Casual  reader,  do  you  care  to  learn  by 
what  muddy  paths  the  unknown,  unwanted, 
walk  into  a  monthly  magazine  ? 

He,  who  had  never  written  aught  but  learned 
dulnesses  before — learned  dulnesses  which-  elu- 
cidated mysteries  which  no  one  cared  to  have 
cleared  up,  or  made  "vulgar,"  buried  and  de- 
composed tongues — he  wrote  a  popular  article 
on  a  popular  subject  in  terse  sentences  that 
told.  He  was  very  much  ashamed  of  himself, 
but  he  could  not  help  itl  He  went  in  for  the 
people  and  general  advancement! — just  as 
though  he  had  been  a  stump  orator,  or  a  penny- 
daily-paper  man.  or  a  Transpontine  stage-mana- 
ger, or  anything  else  that  sold  himself  to  the 
times  in  order  that  the  times  might  pay  him  in 
return. 

His  article  was  a  very  taking  thing,  even  in 
MS.,  when  he  had  finished  it,  a  very  taking  thing 
indeed,  for  he  had  broken  it  up  into  the  briefest 
paragraphs,  and  elaborated  all  his  corrections 
in  a — way  he  would  cease  to  do  when  the  P. 
D.'s  were  howling  for  "  copy"  on  his  door-mat. 
He  treated  of  current  literature  in  this  article ; 
and  as  he  wanted  to  get  it  into  a  magazine  that 
circulated  well,  he  made  believe  to  think  ours 
the  golden  age  of  letters — especially  of  fic- 
tion— in  the  most  obliging  and  popular  man- 
ner. 

When  he  had  written  it,  the  result  was  reada- 
ble, and  there  were  about  twelve  pages  of  it. 
It  was  an  immense  quantity  for  an  unknown, 
unwanted  man  to  get  into  a  good,  well-esta- 
blished magazine.  But  he  was  living  like  a 
gentleman  at  this  period,  as  I  said  before.;  he 
was  wearing  good  broad  cloth  and  pearl  grey 
gloves  stitched  with  black.  And  he  was  espied 
by  the  great  man — by  the  editor  himself — de- 
scending from  a  Hansom. 

In  short,  he  did  not  look  like  a  man  who 
wanted  money;  therefore,  instead  of  being 
snubbed,  and  his  article  being  rejected,  the 
latter  was  accepted,  and  he  was  given  twelve 


78 


ON  GUARD. 


guineas  for  it,  and  altogether  courteously  en- 
treated. 

This  editor  was  just  the  man  to  giye  a  tyro 
heart  to  struggle  on.  He  had  a  hopeful  bearing 
and  a  buoyant  voice,  and  the  face  of  a  huge, 
amiable,  parboiled  baby,  or  say,  of  a  scalded 
cherub — ife  was  so  large,  red,  smooth,  and  hair- 
less. His  suave,  considerate,  promising  man- 
ner sent  shoals  of  aspiring  young  creatures 
away  happy,  even  though  they  were  laden  with 
rejected  MSS.  He  would  not  take  what  they 
offered  him,  or  if  he  did  take  it,  he  paid  them 
more  in  politeness  than  in  coin  of  the  realm. 
Still  he  had  a  cheery  way  of  prognosticating  a 
"brilliant  success"  for  one  of  their  still-to-be 
written  efforts — a  brilliant  success,  and  fifteen 
thousand  pounds  at  least,  which  was  vastly  en- 
couraging. Neither  were  ever  realised,  the  suc- 
cess or  the  fifteen  thousand !  Still,  who  can  say 
that  he  did  no  good  in  his  generation,  when  it 
is  remembered  how  many  hitherto  despondent 
ones  he  had  made  wildly  happy — for  a  day  ? 

When  Stanley  Villars  wended  his  way  the 
second  time  into  the  Presence,  things  assumed 
a  darker  hue.  "You  must  know,  Mr.  Villars," 
the  mighty  man  said  to  him,  "that  I  acted 
with  more  generosity  than  wisdom  in  giving 
your  article  such  a  prominent  place  in  last 
month's  number." 

"  It  rested  with  you  entirely  to  take  or  refuse 
it,"  Stanley  replied  rather  gruffly.  The  round, 
red,  kind,  fat  face  was  rounder,  redder,  kinder, 
and  fatter  than  before  even;  but  Mr.  Villars 
began  to  distrust  it.  He  began  to  do  something 
else,  also — which  was  to  detect  a  certain  as- 
sumption of  mental  superiority  in  the  manner 
of  the  guiding  star  of  that  magazine's  destinies. 
It  struck  him  with  vivid  force  at  once,  that  if 
he  remained,  and  sought  to  continue  the  con- 
nection, that  the  editor  would,  in  the  interests 
of  his  employers,  cause  him  to  pay  a  pretty 
severe  penalty  for  what  was  averred  to  have 
been  an  editorial  lapse  of  judgment.  However, 
he  had  another  article  to  sell,  and  he  wanted 
money ;  therefore  he  remained. 

"  It  rested  entirely  with  you  to  take  or  refuse 
it,"  he  had  said  in  answer  to  the  great  man's 
soft  reproach ;  to  which  Mr.  Bacon  replied — 

"  Gently,  my  dear  sir !  I  am  fully  aware  that 
it  did  rest  entirely  with  me  whether  that  paper, 
in  which,  despite  its  crudeness,  I  was  delighted, 
delighted  to  recognise  evidences  of  great  power 
and  merit,  should  go  into  the  Mag.  or  not.  I 
decided  in  your  favour,  wishing  to  encourage 
young  talent.  I  decided  in  your  favour ;  but 
the  risk  was  very  great,  the  sum  paid  unheard 
of  for  a  beginner.  "When  you  have  made  the 
march  in  literature,  which  I  feel  sure  you  will 
eventually  make,  you  must  remember  your  first 
friend!" 

Stanley  was  externally  grateful  for  the  kindly 
prophecy — internally,  indifferent  as  to  whether 
it  were  ever  realised  or  not.  He  had  no  motive 
for  making  a  name.  Bella  was  lost  to  him — 
stolen  from  him  by  his  friend.  But  men  must 
live,  therefore  they  must  work. 

"You  will  find  this  better  suited  to  the  cha- 
racter of  your  Magazine,"  he  said  quietly,  touch- 
ing his  roll  of  slips;  "it's  not  written  with  the 
almost  pedantic  care  of  the  last ;  it  treats  of  a 
popular  subject,  and  is  a  devilish  deal  more  read- 
able. Will  you  have  it  ?" 


Mr.  Bacoa  took  it  in  his  hand,  glanced  through 
it  hastily,  pursed  up  his  lips  (they  were  small 
lips,  that  crumpled  up  into  a  semblance  of  the 
most  profound  disapprobation  on  the  smalles 
occasion),  and  shook  his  head.  "  You've  work 
ed  it  up  very  well  to  about  the  middle  of  it, 
but  the  end  is  vapid,  dull,  and  flat  in  the  ex- 
treme." 

Mr.  Villars  grew  red  to  the  roots  of  his  hair. 
This  was  free  criticism,  and  no  mistake,  from  a 
man  to  whom  he  had  not  sold  his  brains  and 
soul  yet. 

"You  will  be  good  enough  to  return  it  to 
me,"  he  said  coldly,  holding  out  his  hand  for  it. 
Then  Mr.  Bacon  gently  smiled,  and  softly  tapped 
the  table  with  a  large  plump  forefinger. 

"  Impetuosity  is  fatal  to  a  man  in  literature, 
Mr.  Villars.  I  have  never  before  taken  BO 
strong  an  interest  in  a  young  author  as  I  find 
myself  taking  in  you.  I  shall  not  allow  your 
impetuosity  to  come  between  us.  I  see  before 
you  a  most  brilliant  future ;  you  are  a  rich  mine 
of  gold,  which  only  requires  to  be  worked  pro- 
perly to  make,  not  alone  your  own  fortune,  but 
the  fortunes  of  the  firm ;  and,  by  God,  I  will 
work  it  too !" 

He  seemed  very  much  in  earnest.  Mr.  Vil- 
lars was  conscious  for  a  couple  of  moments  of  a 
thrill  that  would  have  been  ambition,  had  he 
not  lost  Bella. 

"  You  think  then,"  he  commenced — but  Mr. 
Bacon  interrupted  him. 

"  I  think — I  know,  indeed,  that  if  you  will 
only  exercise  patience,  you  will  achieve  great 
things.  I  am  a  practical  working  man,  and  I 
know  what  is  to  be  done  if  you  farm  yourself 
out  properly.  You  must  not  make  yourself  too 
cheap,  and  you  must  not  diffuse  yourself  too 
freely.  Now  about  this  little  thing,"  and  he 
looked  at  Stanley's  article ;  "  it's  not  worth  any- 
thing— scarcely  worth  the  space  it  will  occupy 
in  the  Magazine.  Still  I  shall  insert  it,  for  the 
sake  of  familiarizing  the  public  with  your  name  : 
writers  are  like  actors,  they  must  be  kept  con- 
stantly before  their  great  supporters,  or  their 
great  supporters  will  soon  cease  to  support 
them.  '  The  world  forgetting  by  the  world  for- 
got,' is  a  natural,  inevitable  sequence  in  litera- 
ture." 

"  I  am  quite  willing  to  be  kept  before  the 
public,  since  I  have  no  alternative,"  Stanley 
said,  moodily.  "What  will  you  give  me  for 
this  ?  There  are  about  three  pages  more  than 
in  the  last  article,  but  I  shall  take  the  same 
sum  1" 

Mr.  Bacon  shook  his  head  and  crumpled  up 
his  lips.  "I  will  speak  to  my  sub-editor,"  he 
said,  "  a  man  on  whose  opinion  I  firmly  rely ; 
you  will  then  hear  what  we  can  do,  and  feel 
satisfied  that  we  can  do  no  more  1" 

Mr.  Bacon  awaited  the  advent  of  his  sub, 
with  a  beaming  brow.  He  accredited  Stanley 
Villars  with  the  guileless  unsuspiciousness  of 
the  babe  and  suckling ;  he  thought  his  new  con- 
tributor had  faith,  when,  alas!  he  had  only 
despair.  Mr.  Stanley  Villars  felt  that  he  was 
being  done — but  so  he  would  be,  go  where  he 
would,  he  told  himself. 

The  sub-editor  arrived,  and  looked   at  his 
great  colleague  with  the  inquiring  eye  a  faith-      \ 
ful  terrier  turns  upon  you  when  he  is  desirous 
of  ascertaining  what  particular  rat  is  to  be 


ON  GUARD. 


79 


worried  for  your  delectation.  He  was  a  grimy 
little  man  with  wild  hair,  which  he  tossed  with 
both  hands  frantically,  at  such  odd  moments 
when  his  chief  was  not  looking  at  him. 

"I  have  been  telling  Mr.  Villars,"  Mr.  Bacon 
commenced,  oratorically,  "  that  in  our  anxiety 
to  help  him,  we  were  guilty  of  a  little  error 
with  respect  to  his  last  article ;  you  can  bear  me 
out  in  this  statement." 

The  sub.  evinced  the  greatest  desire  to  do 
so,  but  a  trifling  inability  to  comprehend  the 
precise  way  in  which  it  would  be  well  to  do  it. 

"  Mr.  Villars  will  be  shocked  to  hear,  that 
through  the  injudicious  prominence  we  gave  to 
a  paper  that  was  full  of  genius,  and  also  full  of 
the  faults  of  a  beginner,  our  circulation  has  de- 
creased in  a  manner  that  is  truly  marvellous  1 
marvellous  I" 

Mr.  Stanley  Villars  expressed  himself  shocked, 
but  unbelieving. 

"  This,  though,  I  can  show  you  by  our  books," 
the  editor  went  on  glibly — not  offering  to  pro- 
duce a  single  book,  by  the  way,  but  speaking 
in  a  convincing  tone  that  rendered  ocular  de- 
monstration unnecessary.  "However,  this  is 
not  to  the  point ;  what  I  propose  to  Mr.  Villars 
is,  that  we  give  him  another  chance  in  the  Mag. 
as  an  essay  writer,  but  that  he  does  not  rely  on 
that  chance;  in  short,  that  he  gives  all  the 
powers  of  one  of  the  most  gifted  minds"  (here 
he  bowed  the  plump  cherub  vision  gracious- 
ly towards  Stanley)  "  I  have  ever  been  fortu- 
nate enough  to  como  in  contact  with,  to  fic- 
tion." 

"You  will  take  the  article  then?"  Stanley 
asked ;  the  long,  pompous  speeches  were  weary- 
ing things  to  which  to  listen,  despite  their  en- 
couraging flattery. 

"  We  will  take  the  article—/  will  take  the 
article,  convinced  that  the  firm,  in  whose  inte- 
rests I  am  acting,  will  have  cause  to  extol  that 
foresight  on  my  part,  which  now  they  might  be 
disposed  to  denominate  rashness." 

"  What  will  you  give  me  for  it?" 

Mr.  Bacon  glanced  at  his  satellite ;  his  satel- 
lite glanced  at  him  in  return. 

"  It  would  be  impossible,"  they  both  began, 
and  both  paused,  politely  ceding  the  right  of 
speech  to  the  other. 

"Pray  proceed,"  the  suave  chief  said.  Ac- 
cordingly the  grimy  sub.  proceeded. 

"It  is  against  the  rule  of  the  magazine  to  pay 
anything  for  casual  articles.  Authors  are  too 
glad  to  see  their  names  in  it  at  all ;  it  makes  the 
running  for  other  and  more  important  works, 
in  a  way  that  is  invaluable  to  fresh  starters  in 
the  great  literary  race." 

"  You  see,  Mr.  Villars?"  Mr.  Bacon  observed. 

"  I  see  that  you  don't  think  my  wares  worth 
anything,  so  I  must  take  them  elsewhere," 
Stanley  Villars  said,  in  a  disappointed  tone.  He 
saw  that  he  was  being  done ;  he  felt  that  they 
were  merely  trying  how  far  undervaluing  him 
would  benefit  themselves.  Still  he  had  not  the 
aeart  to  combat  .  the  palpable  chicanery — he 
nad  not  the  spirit  to  risk  a  failure  on  the  chance 
»f  making  some  better  success.  He  "  feared 
nis  fate  too  much."  In  fact,  he  dreaded  a  dull 
thumping  fall  down  into  utter  poverty,  utter 
distress,  and  despair,  all  at  once.  So,  though 
he  said  ''  I  must  take  them  elsewhere,"  he  said 
it  in  a  tone  that  told  plainly  as  possible  how 


dreary  their  chances  of  being  "  accepted  else- 
where" were. 

"  You  will  take  them  elsewhere  ? — good,"  the 
editor  replied,  grandiloquently.  "Now,  my 
dear  sir,  before  we  separate  and  you  go  off  to 
certain  disappointment,  allow  me  to  ask  a  very 
delicate  question — a  very  delicate  question,  in 
deed?" 

"  Ask  it,"  Stanley  replied. 

"  Is  the  insertion  of  this  article— the  immedi- 
ate insertion — of  monetary  importance  to  you?" 

"  What  the  hell  difference  does  that  make  to 
you?  "  Stanley  answered  hotly.  "  I  have  offer- 
ed it  to  you  for  a  sum  that's  paltry  enough, 
G-od  knows — if  He  cares  to  know  aught  of  my 
affairs  any  longer,  which  I  doubt — and  you 
have  refused  it.  Let  the  matter  end  there. 
Good  morning." 

"  The  matter  shall  not  end  there ! "  the  edi- 
tor responded,  hastily.  He  had  no  intention  of 
permitting  this  fly  to  escape  his  net.  "My 
dear  sir,  suffer  me  to  speak ;  I  cannot  see  such 
brilliant  abilities  founder  close  upon  the  start- 
ing shore,  for  want  of  a  few  favouring  breezes. 
We  will  take  your  article ;  draw  upon  me  for 
what  sum  you  require,  since  unfortunately  the 
usual  want  of  money  in  the  world  is  oppressing 
you.  Draw  on  me  for  what  sum  you  may  re- 
quire—say a  hundred  pounds — and  work  it  off, 
write  off  the  debt  as  occasion  serves.  Do  you 
agree  ?  " 

"  If  my  writings  are  worth  nothing,  how  may 
I  ever  hope  to  work  off  the  debt?"  Stanley 
asked. 

"  Their  value  will  be  increased  prodigiously 
after  this  article  has  appeared  in  the  place  I 
shall  now  assign  it  in  the  Mag." 

"  Then  if  you  can  venture  to  assign  it  a 
'  good  place,' — whatever  that  may  mean — all 
the  pages  of  a  magazine  seem  of  equal  merit  to 
me — why  can't  you  pay  me  for  it  ?  It  must  be 
worth  something." 

"In  itself,  no!"  the  gigantic  cherub  replied, 
decisively ;  "  but  we  shall  now  have  a  motive  in 
giving  it  an  adventitious  importance.  You 
shall  be  successful,  Mr.  Villars,  and  when  you 
are  we  should  like  something  beyond  your 
mere  word  to  assure  us  that  we  shall  not  be 
unrewarded.  You  will  not  forget  first  friends  ?" 

As  Mr.  Bacon  accompanied  this  remark  with 
a  cheque  for  one  hundred  pounds,  and  as  Stan- 
ley Villars  sorely  needed  the  money,  the  latter 
answered  somewhat  effusively  that  he  would 
not  object  to  giving  some  pledge  more  tangible 
than  his  mere  word  as  to  his  readiness  to  supply 
"copy"  till  the  debt  should  be  worked  out. 
Accordingly  Mr.  Bacon  daintily  prepared  a  little 
paper  which  Stanley  daintily  signed,  which 
committed  him  to  write  for  the  firm,  and  the 
firm  alone,  under  divers  heavy  penalties,  for  the 
term  of  three  years. 

"By  that  time  you  will  have  taken  your 
stand  in  literature  and  will  see  what  you  are 
about,"  Mr.  Bacon  remarked  in  a  gaudy  manner. 
"You  will  see  what  you  are  about,  and  we 
shall  see  what  you  are  made  of.  Never  before 
have  we  taken  a  young  author  so  enthusiasti- 
cally by  the  hand ;  do  not  disappoint  us." 

"  God  of  heaven  1"  Stanley  thought,  "  has  it 
come  to  this  already ;  to  be  patronised  and  pro- 
tected, to  be  '  taken  in  hand'  by  such  a  cad  as 
this!"  - 


80 


ON  GUARD. 


However,  though  he  thought  thus,  he  pocket- 
ed the  cheque  for  a  hundred  pounds,  and  Mr. 
Bacon  held  the  "  little  formula"  which  bound 
him  to  do  their  bidding  for  three  years !  The 
business  had  managed  itself  marvellously ! 

After  this  second  interview  and  marvellous 
management  of  the  business,  there  were  no  dif- 
ficulties intervening  between  Stanley  Yillars 
and  publicity.  He  was  incessant  in  the  maga- 
zine which  had  been  the  receptacle  of  his  first 
attempt  at  popular  writing ;  and  not  alone  in 
that  magazine,  but  in  others  which  emanated 
under  apparently  different  supervision  from  the 
same  source.  The  initials,  "  S.  V.,"  came  to  be 
well  known.  More  than  that,  they  came  to  be 
eagerly  looked  for.  Better  still,  they  were  missed 
when  by  chance  absent.  On  the  whole,  in  fact, 
they  were  liked ! 

The  bar  between  publicity  and  himself  was 
broken  down  in  fact,  and  Stanley  Yillars  had 
no  cause  to  be  ill  pleased  with  the  manner  in 
which  that  "  many-headed  pig,  the  public,"  as  he 
called  it,  grunted  forth  its  satisfaction  at  his 
efforts  in  its  behalf.  He  was  well  received. 
Benighted  outsiders,  who  were  happily  ignorant 
of  the  backstairs  work  that  is  going  on,  regard- 
ed him  as  rising,  prosperous,  wondrously  lucky. 
His  sister-in-law  heard  of  him  from  unconscious 
friends,  who  liked  to  sting  her  with  civility,  not 
so  much  as  a  success,  but  as  the  success ;  and 
Lady  Yillars  repeated  these  sayings  to  Florence, 
winding  up  with  a  scoff  at  that  perverted  state 
of  mind  "  which  kept  Stanley  in  the  purlieus  of 
low  Bohemianism  when  he  was  doing  so  well 
ind  might  escape  from  them,  and  live  like  a 
gentleman,  although  (with  bitter  emphasis)  he 
vrote."  She — that  stern  young  judge — was  as 
gnorant  as  was  poor  Florence  of  that  little 
wond  he  had  signed,  which  held  him  closely  in 
the  meshes  of  the  enterprising  firm  who  were 
reaping  the  benefit  of  his  brains. 

The  £100  for  which  he  had  gone  into  this 
ignominious  bondage,  were  long  spent  when  we 
meet  with  him  again,  on  the  bright  March 
morning — the  day  after  the  "meet"  at  Horsley 
Hollow.  He  was  going  on  now,  day  by  day, 
spinning  off  yards  of  slips  with  the  velocity  of 
despair ;  writing  "  to  order"  generally,  and  sell- 
ing his  copyrights  for  the  most  beggarly  sums. 
He  was  kept  before  the  public  with  a  vengeance ; 
but  his  brain  was  often  likely  to  burst  in  the 
attempt  to  meet  the  demands  made  upon  it. 
He  was. writing  to  live  now;  he  had  hired  out 
his  mind! — he  had  drawn  in  advance  on  the 
obliging  firm  who  were  never  "hard  upon 
young  authors !"  he  was  the  veriest  slave  in 
the  cursed  trade  that  men  drive  in  the  noblest 
of  all  professions. 

On  this  special  morning  he  was  very  hard  at 
work.  He  was  striving  to  work  himself  free  of 
his  debt  by  supplying  a  novel  for  one  magazine, 
and  a  series  of  articles  on  the  "  Early  Fathers" 
in  another.  The  price  given  for  both  these  per- 
formances was  of  such  delicate  dimensions,  that 
it  would  be  but  a  drop  in  the  ocean  of  his  debt. 
But  he  had  no  appeal ;  he  could  not  carry  his 
wares  elsewhere  until  the  term  of  bondage  had 
expired. 

Have  you  ever  seen  this  mental  hemlock 
growing  up  and  threatening  to  overshadow  and 
poison  a  man's  life  ?  You  can  only  act  the  part 
of  the  Levite ;  there  is  nothing  that  you  can  do, 


for  rest  assured  that  the  man  who  is  in  such  a 
plight,  and  who  feels  it  as  Stanley  Villars  did, 
will  not  howl  his  grievances  aloud.  There  is 
nothing  to  be  done,  so  pass  by  circumspectly 
on  the  other  side. 

The  wild  old  legends  of  men  who  sold  them- 
selves to  the  devil  for  gold  in  olden  times,  are 
paralleled  in  these  latter  days.  Only  instead  of 
selling  themselves  for  much  gold,  they  sell  them- 
selves very  often  for  a  mess  of  pottage.  The 
Moloch  of  the  press  is  insatiable — and  very 
mean. 

He  had  fallen  away  from  the  haunts  and  the 
friends  of  his  youth.  He  had  cut  himself  off 
from  all,  in  his  first  dull  agony  of  rage  against 
the  false  love,  and  the  false  friend,  and  the  frail 
faith  ;  all  of  which  had  deserted  him,  and  proved 
weak  when  tried.  He  had  cut  himself  off  from 
these,  and  had  only  replaced  them  by  acquain- 
tances of  the  hour.  As  his  strait  grew  sorer 
and  sorer,  he  felt  that  there  was  not  one  to 
whom  he  could  apply — no,  not  one ! 

For  he  would  not  cloud  what  might  be  bright 
in  Florence's  life  by  allowing  her  to  know  how 
utterly  his  own  was  blasted.  "Let  her  be 
happy,  if  she  might  and  could  be,"  he  said  to 
himself,  as  if  the  poor  loving  child  could  be 
happy  while  he  maintained  this  miserable 
silence.  He  made  no  sign  to  her,  and  so  she 
could  only  lament  him  in  uncertainty  and  dark- 
ness. 

He  was  working  very  hard  this  morning, 
and  he  had  been  working  very  hard  all  night. 
"They  were  going  to  press  the  following  day," 
an  imperative  missive  from  head-quarters  had 
informed  him  the  previous  night,  and  the  second 
of  the  two  chapters  of  the  novel  that  he  was 
bound  to  supply  was  still  unwritten ! 

Oh !  the  folly  of  it !  The  almost  awful  folly 
of  sitting  there  through  long  weary  hours  writ- 
ing what  his  judgment  declared  to  be  twaddle. 
The  miserable  littleness  of  doing  a  dialogue  that 
was  as  utterly  unlike  anything  human  beings 
would  have  said  to  one  another  under  any  cir- 
cumstances, as  were  the  circumstances  under 
which  it  was  spoken  unlike  any  combination 
that  could  possibly  have  taken  place  in  real 
life.  The  awful  folly  of  it !— the  ill-paid  folly  of 
it!  But  it  was  to  be  done,  so  he  went  on 
doing  it. 

I  presume  that  the  profound  conviction  of 
the  game  not  being  worth  the  candle  is  apt  to 
oppress  the  mind  of  every  writer  with  more  or 
less  frequency.  That  we  who  are  still  on  the 
lowest  round  of  the  ladder  suffer  from  it  acutely 
very  often,  I  can  testify.  But  in  the  lives  of  all 
there  must  be  many  hours  of  that  intense,  in- 
describable anguish  of  fatigue,  which  can  only 
be  tasted  to  the  full  by  those  who,  while  worn 
out  mentally  and  bodily,  with  a  perfect  com- 
pleteness that  appears  to  admit  of  no  increase,, 
are  compelled  to  still  hold  a  pen,  and  go  on 
•staining  the  paper  with  what  might  be  their 
heart's  blood  by  the  hurt  it  gives  them. 

There  was  a  chalky  look  around  his  lips,  his 
eyelids  were  swollen,  and  his  eyes  red  and 
sunken  at  last  when  he  laid  the  pen  down,  and 
commenced  gathering  up  the  sheets  of  copy, 
taking  a  note  of  the  MS.  when  he  came  to  the 
last,  and  writing  down  in  his  note-book  the  last  I 
few  lines  in  a  way  that  plainly  told  its  own 
story.  He  would  go  off  when  the  time  came  to 


ON  GUARD. 


81 


supply  his  next  instalment,  with  just  those 
few  lines  as  a  guide  for  the  future,  and  a 
reminder  of  what  had  gone  before.  As  he  did 
so,  the  postman's  knock  sounded  sharply,  and 
before  he  had  time  to  give  a  sigh  to  the  times 
when  his  work  had  been  conducted  in  so  wide- 
ly different  a  way,  the  servant  came  into  his 
room  with  a  letter  ;  and,  for  the  first  time  since 
she  had  sent  him  his  dismissal  at  Denharn,  he 
saw  the  handwriting  of  Bella  Vane. 


CHAPTER   XXY. 

"THAT  WOMAN." 


MAJOR  WALSINGHAM  sat  speechless  in  the  cor- 
ner of  the  carriage  during  the  whole  of  the 
drive  home  after  that  pleasant  luncheon  at  the 
Harpers'  at  which  Lady  Lexley  had  conceived 
such  a  vast  toleration  for  Bella.  He  sat  speech- 
less— a  bad  sign  in  itself.  "Worse  than  this, 
he  looked  what  Bella  emphatically  termed 
"glum." 

Mrs.  Claude  left  her  husband  to  the  undis- 
turbed enjoyment  of  his  silence  and  glumness 
till  the  carriage  drew  up  at  the  hall  door  of  the 
Court.  Then,  when  he  was  handing  her  out, 
she  said — 

"  I'm  so  cold,  Claude  ;  can't  we  go  for  a  run 
before  dinner  ?" 

"  You  can  go  for  a  run  if  you  please,  I  sup- 
pose," he  replied  grimly. 

"  Blessings  on  you  for  the  gracious  permis- 
sion ;  I  know  I  can  go,  but  I  want  you  to  go 
with  me." 

"Then  I  am  afraid  you  will  not  have  what 
you  want  in  this  instance,"  he  said  coldly,  and 
Bella  saw  that  the  red  spots  were  very  visible 
in  his  eyes,  and  that  he  looked  stern  and  cold. 

"Claude!  what  is  the  matter?"  she  asked, 
following  him  into  the  hall,  and  laying  her 
hand  on  his  arm.  "  What  is  the  matter  ?"  she 
repeated  eagerly.  "Come  in  here;"  and  she 
pushed  the  library  door  open  and  went  in 
hastily  with  him. 

"The  matter  I  the  matter*  is  that  I  am  very 
much  annoyed,"  he  replied,  while  Bella  stirred 
the  dully  burning  fire  fiercely,  causing  a  large 
blaze  to  leap  up  and  show  how  flushed  her 
cheek  was,  and  how  brilliant  her  eyes. 

"  What  are  you  annoyed  about  ?"  she  asked, 
standing  right  in  front  of  him  with  her  hat  in 
her  hand,  and  her  face  upturned  to  his  gaze 
frankly.  "  What  are  you  annoyed  about  ?" 

"You." 

"  What  have  I  done,  or  left  undone  ?  What 
is  it,  Claude  ?" 

"Don't  speak  in  that  peremptory  tone  to 
me  !"  he  said  coldly. 

"  Ah  !  think  a  little  of  what  /  feel  at  your 
tone !  What  have  I  done ;  tell  me  ?" 

"  Made  me  a  laughing-stock  for  the  neigh- 
bourhood as  well  as  yourself." 

M  Claude  I" 

"You  have;  don't  deny  it,  Bella:  were  you 
not  thrown  from  your  horse  the  other  day? 
You  may  as  well  tell  the  truth,  for  I  know  it." 

She  laughed  out.     "  Is  that  all  ?    Yes,  I  was, 
only  I  wouldn't  tell  for  fear  of  your  not  letting 
me  ride  Devilskin  to-morrow." 
6 


"  I  shall  not  let  you  ride  now,  you  may  be 
very  certain ;  not  because  you  were  awkward 
enough  to  come  off,  but  because  of  what  fol- 
lowed. Really,  madam,"  he  began,  walking  up 
and  down  the  room  with  hasty  strides,  for  the 
purpose  of  getting  his  anger  up  to  the  proper 
pitch,  "I  thin-k  you  might  have  a  little  more 
respect  for  your  husband  than  to — to — hea- 
vens !  I  can  hardly  express  myself  about  it — 
conduct  yourself  in  the  way  you  did.!" 

"In  what  way?"  she  asked,  wonderingly. 
She  was  pallid  with  anger.  Major  Walsingham 
imagined  her  to  be  pallid  from  fear.  She  had 
entirely  forgotten  Jack's  cubbish  salute. 

"  In  what  way,  Bella  ?  Don't  affect  to  have 
forgotten,  or  to  regard  the  occurrence  as  one  of 
no  consequence.  Jack  is  a  young  fool ;  but  I 
don't  choose  to  have  a  young  fool,  simply  be- 
cause he  is  my  brother,  treating  my  wife  as  he 
would  any  woman  for  whom  he'd  no  respect." 

"Claude!  you  don't  know  what  you  are 
saying." 

"  Don't  I,  faith !  I  know  very  well.  Now  I'll 
have  no  more  of  it,  Bella ;  I'll  have  no  more  of 
it." 

"Of  what?" 

"  Of  this  cursed  philandering  with  Jack!" 

"How  can  you — how  dare  that  woman  ac- 
cuse me  of  it  ?  I  saw  her  that  day — that  un- 
fortunate day." 

"What  woman? — I  mean  you're  quite  mis- 
taken," Claude  said  confusedly.  "  I  have  heard 
of  your  conduct,  and  I'm  very  much  annoyed. 
Why  you  should  imagine  Lady  Lexley  to  be 
my  informant,  I  don't  know." 

*"  It  was  Lady  Lexley — she  passed  me  after- 
wards. Let  me  tell  you  now  how  it  happened, 
Claude,"  and  she  proceeded  to  attempt  to  ex- 
plain. 

But  Major  Walsingham  would  not  be  a 
patient  listener.  He  was  angry — I  may  almost 
go  so  far  as  to  say  he  was  infuriated  against 
his  brother  and  his  bride  for  having  placed  him 
in  such  a  position  that  he  might  be  laughed  at. 
He  did  not  want  to  hear  Bella's  explanations, 
therefore  he  would  not  listen. 

"  I  shall  put  a  stop  to  these  long  lonely  rides 
with  Jack.  Your  cursed  vanity  has  led  you 
into  the  coil.  You  have  nothing  to  do  down 
here,  so  I  suppose  you  thought  you  would  get 
Jack  in  your  train — a  grand  triumph !"  he  said 
mockingly. 

Mrs.  Claude  turned  to  leave  the  room. 
When  she  reached  the  door  she  paused. 

"Will  you  speak  reasonably  about  it, 
Claude?  Don't  accuse  me  of  entertaining 
such  a  puerile  motive :  you  know  yourself  that 
it  is  false." 

"  I  know  nothing  of  the  kind.  Judging  from 
your  antecedents,  I  should  say " 

She  was  back  by  his  side  like  a  flash  of 
light. 

"  Don't  say  those  words,  Claude !" 

"  That  you  were  not  the  one  to  evade  a  flirta- 
tion if  it  came  in  your  way.  Now,  don't  treat 
me  to  hysterics  or  asseverations  of  innocence. 
The  boy  is  a  booby ;  but  as  he  didn't  know 
how  to  treat  you  with  fitting  respect,  you  ought 
to  have  taught  him." 

"  Fitting  respect ! — your  own  brother!" 

"  G-ood  God,  you  don't  mean  to  tell  me  that 
you  would  smile  and  be  happy  if  all  my  brothers 


82 


UJN    UUARD. 


took  it  into  their  heads  to  kiss  and  caress  you ! 
If  you  don't  learn  greater  prudence  and  cir- 
cumspection, we  shall  both  have  cause  to  rue 
the  day  we  met." 

"  I  think  we  shall,"  she  said,  sadly,  and  then  she 
went  away  with  a  sober  face,  and  step,  and  heart. 

She  was  sure  of  it  I  That  woman — that 
dark  winsome  woman,  who  had  been  so  smil- 
ing and  so  suave  to  her — was  the  one  who  had 
given  Claude  the  dagger,  and  shown  him  where 
to  strike.  Bella  saw  it  all.  The  old  love  for 
Claude,  and  the  animus  against  herself,  Claude's 
hapless  wife.  "  I  must  be  on  guard  against 
her,  or  she'll  poison  my  life,"  Bella  thought 
The  idea,  the  wild  idea  of  it's  being  the  fair, 
placid  Miss  Harper  against  whom  it  would  be 
well  to  be  on  guard,  never  struck  her. 

Sitting  there,  in  the  solitude  of  the  big,  state 
bed-room  of  her  husband's  father's  house,  she 
began  to  feel  alone,  friendless — very,  very  deso- 
late I  Claude  had  repulsed  her.  He  had  been 
hard,  and  cruel,  and  rude,  at  the  instigation  of 
"that  woman  1"  It  was  wonderful  the  way  in 
which  she  hated  the  woman  who  had  done  her 
no  ill.  It  was  wonderful  that  no  instinct  led 
her  to  beware  of  the  one  who  was  ready  to 
strike  her  down  with  a  stunning  force,  should 
opportunity  offer. 

Her  desolation  grew  upon  her  as  she  reflect- 
ed that  the  harmless  bond  which  had  existed 
between  Jack  and  herself  was  to  be  snapped. 
She  felt  desperately  ill-used,  and  desperately 
ill-tempered,  as  one  is  apt  to  feel  under  such 
circumstances.  They  were  all  cold  and  hard  to 
her  down  here — cold,  and  hard,  and  horribly 
unjust !  Claude  was  these  things  to  an  even 
stronger  degree  than  the  rest  of  his  family ;  and 
that  he  was  so  at  the  instigation  of  the  hand- 
some, not  too  well  authenticated  Lady  Lexley, 
she  felt  firmly  convinced.  Bella  sat  down,  and 
hated  Lady  Lexley  vigorously  for  a  few  minutes 
— hated  her  for  her  florid  manner  and  those 
witching  ways  which  had  failed  in  deceiving 
her,  Bella,  but  had  done  their  work  so  well 
upon  Claude — hated  her  for  being  the  indirect 
cause  of  putting  a  stop  to  that  run  with  Mark- 
ham's  hounds,  the  prospect  which  had  made 
things  endurable  for  the  last  few  days, — hated 
her,  in  fact,  as  only  a  woman  can  hate  the  one 
whose  influence  over  the  man  she  loves,  she 
fancies  to  be  stronger  than  her  own.  After 
hating  Lady  Lexley  vigorously  in  inaction  for 
a  few  minutes,  she  rose  up  and  bethought  her- 
self of  Stanley  Villars,  and  resolved  to  write 
to  him,  telling  him  how  that  she  wanted  a 
friend  and  adviser,  and  entreating  him  to  be 
the  former  to  her,  and  give  her  the  latter  for 
the  sake  of  the  old  days  that  her  heart  now 
ached  to  recall. 

She  wrote  her  letter,  but  she  did  not  say 
quite  all  she  had  intended  saying  when  she 
first  thought  of  writing  to  him.  Her  heart 
yearned  for  sympathy,  and  so  she  sought  it 
from  him  in  a  roundabout  way,  since  her  hus- 
band appeared  bent  on  refusing  it  to  her;  but 
she  did  not  tell  him  this.  She  only  told  him 
that  Claude  and  herself  were  going  back  to 
town  early  in  the  following  week,  and  begged 
that  he  would  come  and  see  her  at  once. 
"  You  have  shown  yourself  capable  of  so  much, 
that  you  will  give  me  this  great  pleasure,"  she 
wrote.  "  Besides,  you  promised  to  come  to 


me  did  I  ever  need  you.  I  need  you  now; 
and  I  know  that  you  are  not  one  to  break  a 
promise." 

Her  sole  motive  in  applying  to  Stanley  Vil- 
lars was  that  he  might  come  to  them,  and  when 
he  had  heard  a  bit,  the  merest  bit  of  the  story 
of  her  venial  error,  and  Claude's  virulent  de- 
nunciation of  it,  that  he  might  "  speak  to 
Claude,"  and  impress  upon  him  that  so  long  as 
the  guiding  hand  was  heavy  she  would  jiffle. 
"  No  one  knows  that  better  than  Stanley,"  she 
thought,  "  and  no  one  can  impress  the  truth  of 
it  so  vividly  upon  Claude.  Some  one  ought  to 
tell  Claude  that  he  is  going  the  way  to  alienate 
me ;  and  I'm  sure  mamma  can't." 

However,  when  she  had  enclosed  her  letter 
and  directed  it  to  Mr.  Villars,  at  the  office  of 
the  magazine  in  which  she  had  marked,  with  a 
very  lax  interest,  for  some  two  or  three  months 
past,  that  he  wrote,  she  thought  she  would  try 
another  plan  first.  Claude  had  been  rash  and 
rude  in  not  hearing  her  spoken  words,  but  sure- 
ly he  would  read  a  written  appeal. 

Her  letter  to  her  husband,  the  whole  of  which 
I  shall  not  transcribe,  was  a  trifle  high  flown, 
perhaps,  but  it  was  thoroughly  meant.  She 
told  him  how  well  she  knew  her  own  faults, 
and  how  she  lamented  them,  and  she  implored 
him  not  to  urge  her  on  to  any  display  of  wil- 
fulness  by  judging  her  over-harshly,  and  re- 
buking her  at  the  instigation  of  any  one.  She 
told  him  how  she  had  married  him,  firmly  in- 
tending to  be  led  and  directed  by  him  in  all 
things,  honestly  and  sincerely  wishing  to  bow 
her  will  to  his.  "But" — the  old  defiant  spirit 
would  crop  up,  humbly  as  she  strove  to  write — 
"  I  must  be  led  and  directed,  not  driven.  Dear 
Claude,  say  to  me  kindly  that  you  wish  me  to 
give  up  anything,  everything  in  the  world,  and 
I  will  do  it  without  hesitation ;  but  do  not  order 
me  with  anger  on  your  brow  and  in  your  tones, 
as  though  I  had  been  a  grievous  culprit,  and 
you  were  a  stern  judge,  instead  of  a  loving 
husband.  Anger  is  as  a  blight  to  me — God 
knows  what  may  wither  under  it.  Let  me  feel 
that  I  may  turn  to  you  without  the  dread  of  a 
rebuff,  and  then  I  shall  turn  to  you  on  all 
occasions." 

There  was  a  little  more,  but  it  was  all  in  the 
same  strain.  It  wag  a  warm,  loving,  earnest, 
illogical  plea,  and  her  heart  beat  high  as  she 
carried  it  into  her  husband's  dressing-room, 
and  placed  it  on  the  table  before  him.  "  Will 
you  read  this,  Claude?"  she  asked,  timidly, 
and  he  (almost  dreading  that  it  might  be 
some  rash  declaration  of  an  intention  to  do 
something  the  mere  thought  of  which  made  his 
heart  stand  still)  said,  "  Yes,  he  would." 

He  read  it.  She,  standing  just  inside  the 
door,  waiting  for  him  to  turn  and  take  her  in 
his  arms,  and  pet  and  caress,  and  "make  it  all 
up  with  her,"  saw  him  read  it  through  without 
pausing  once.  It  was  so  much  better,  so  much 
more  conciliatory  than  he  had  anticipated,  that 
he  reminded  himself  that  now  was  the  time  to 
teach  her  to  have  done  with  her  old  rebellious 
habits — that  nonsense  could  be  safely  put  an 
end  to  at  once  and  for  ever. 

"  My  dear  Bella,"  he  said,  tearing  the  letter 
in  two  and  throwing  the  pieces  away  from  him 
carelessly,  "  you  might  just  as  well  have  said 
all  this  (or  rather  have  left  it  unsaid)  as  have 


ON  GUARD. 


83 


written  it :  it  is  not  a  very  sensible  or  pleasing 
way  of  taking  a  reproof  that  was  as  mild  as 
any  man  who  cared  a  rap  for  his  honour  could 
have  administered." 

"  Is  that  all  you'll  say  to  me  ?" 

"  That  is  all  I  have  to  say.  Perhaps  you  will 
be  good  enough  to  go  and  get  ready  for  dinner ; 
my  mother  will  hardly  appreciate  the  reason  of 
your  being  late." 

"  That  I  am  sure  she  will  not — you  needn't 
impress  it  upon  me,"  Bella  said.  Then  the 
tears  started  into  her  eyes,  and  she  got  away 
out  of  his  presence  hastily,  with  a  big  strong 
feeling  in  her  beating  heart  that  he  was  hard 
and  callous— he,  the  man  for  whom  she  had 
jilted  Stanley  Villars.  The  letter  should  go 
to  Stanley,  after  all.  She  needed  kindness,  she 
needed  a  friend,  she  needed  and  was  justified 
in  seeking  one,  for  her  husband  had  repulsed 
her. 

So  the  letter  went  to  Stanley  Villars ;  and, 
to  Claude's  surprise,  that  night  Bella  was  as 
glittering  and  as  cold  as  steel 


CHAPTER  XXVI. 
A  RUN  WITH  MARKHAM'S  HOUNDS. 

THE  following  morning  was  as  trying  a  one  to 
Mrs.  Claude  "Walsingham  as  the  most  deter- 
mined advocate  of  her  being  "  kept  under,"  and 
taught  to  submit  her  unruly  desires  to  the 
wiser  ones  around,  could  have  wished.  Claude 
and  Jack  breakfasted  with  them  in  pink.  Mr. 
Markham  had  started  off  at  an  earlier  hour  to 
interfere  with  his  huntsman  as  to  the  hounds 
which  should  be  drafted  off  for  this  day's  sport. 
So  all  that  Bella  saw  was  gallant,  dashing,  and 
gay.  Mr.  Markham  might  have  marred  the 
harmony  both  of  colour  and  proportion,  for  his 
coat  was  time-worn  and  faded,  and  he  was 
heavy  and  fat. 

Claude  was  a  bit  of  a  dandy — the  majority  of 
men  who  have  well-balanced  souls  and  a, proper 
appreciation  of  the  beautiful  are.  No  more  dar- 
ing rider  could  be  found  in  any  hunting-field 
than  Major  "Walsingham ;  no  man  had  ever  seen 
him  swerve  or  hesitate,  no  man  had  ever  seen 
him  blunder  or  blench,  no  man  had  ever  seen 
him  quit  the  saddle  without  good  cause.  But 
he  always  came  to  the  meet  neat  and  trim, 
spotless,  free  from  travel-soil  or  splash,  unheat- 
ed,  unwearied,  in  a  little  brougham  and  a  big 
grey  wrap  that  covered  him  from  head  to  foot. 

To  see  him  step  from  the  little  brougham,  and 
the  next  moment  settle  to  the  saddle,  and  the 
stride  of  his  grand  grey  hunter,  was  a  sight  that 
women  congregated  from  far  and  near  to  wit- 
ness. He  had  just  that  happy  mixture  of 
power  and  refinement  that  women  love;  he 
could  button  the  tiniest  glove  round  the  tiniest 
wrist  dexterously  in  one  moment,  and  dash  at 
the  most  tremendous  fence  with  equal  dexterity 
in  the  next.  Claude  was  a  man  to  watch  in 
the  field,  whether  it  were  of  sport  or  love ;  and 
this  morning,  as  his  wife  sat  at  breakfast  with 
him,  and  saw  him  for  the  first  time  in  "  pink," 
she  felt  that  he  did  not  care  for  her  to  go  and 
watch  him. 

Up  to  the  very  last,  up  to  the  moment  of  his 


donning  the  big  grey  wrap,  up  to  the  moment 
of  the  little  brougham  coming  round  to  convey 
this  dainty  Nirnrod  to  the  field,  she  hoped  that 
he  would  "  make  friends  "  and  order  Devilskin  ; 
or  at  least  tell  her  to  be  happy,  and  graciously 
invite  her  to  go  and  witness  the  glorious  sight 
he  would  presently  offer.  But  he  did  not  do 
so;  partly  because  he  thought  she  had  been 
wrong,  and  that  it  behoved  him  to  teach  her 
that  she  had  been  wrong,  and  partly  because 
he  did  not  know  how  hotly  her  heart  was  set 
upon  going. 

When  he  was  gone,  when  the  brougham  had 
rolled  out  of  sight,  and  she  was  left  alone  with 
the  stern  matrons,  his  mother  and  sister,  neither 
of  whom  had  hunting  or  any  other  fast  propen- 
sities, the  devil  of  defiance  rose  in  her  breast, 
and  she  went  and  rang  the  bell  resolutely. 

"I  want  my  horse,  Devilskin,  round  directly ; 
and  Hill  must  take  something  and  go  with  me," 
she  said  when  it  was  answered. 

"  Are  you  going  out  for  a  ride  already  ?"  her 
sister-in-law  asked. 

"  Yes,"  Bella  replied,  somewhat  shortly.  "  I 
feel  like  myself  when  I  am  out  with  my  own 
horse  and  my  own  man." 

"  Terribly  wilful !  She  must  be  a  fearful  trial 
to  poor  Claude,"  his  mother  remarked,  as  Bella 
left  the  room. 

"  Tes.  I  can't  make  her  out,"  his  sister,  Mrs. 
Markham,  replied — "I  can't  make  her  out  at 
all.  I  believe  she's  trying  to  coquette  with  that 
poor  boy  Jack." 

"  I  do  not  believe  it." 

"  My  dear  mother!  "Well,  be  happy  in  your 
unbelief,  for  it  wouldn't  be  pleasant;  but  you 
know  what  we  have  heard  of  her;  you  know 
what  a  shameful  unblushing  flirt  she  has  been. 
For  my  own  part,  I  would  rather  Claude  had 
married  the  most  stupid  woman  in  the  world, 
than  one  whose  insatiable  love  of  conquest 
leads  her  to  pursue  it  in  her  husband's  family." 

"I  think  you  are  a  little  hard  on  her,  El- 
len." 

"Hard  on  her!  Hear  what  your  favourite, 
Gracie  Harper,  says  of  her,  then,  mother,  if  you 
doubt  me — '  I  know  something  about  her  that  I 
would  rather  cut  my  tongue  out  than  repeat, 
Mrs.  Markham,'  she  said  to  me,  yesterday ;  and 
when  a  quiet,  amiable  girl  such  as  Gracie  says 
that,  one  does  feel  doubtful." 

Old  Mrs.  "Walsingham  shook  her  head. 

"Very  doubtful  indeed;  but  not  of  poor 
Bella,"  she  said,  tremulously.  "Leave  the  sub- 
ject, dear ;  I  may  have  done  more  harm  than 
good  in  striving  to  win  a  fitting  wife  for  my 
son ;  but  you  do  think  Gracie  amiable  and  true, 
don't  you ;  she  would  never " 

"  Say  a  word  against  any  one — oh,  no  !  I'm 
sure  of  it,"  Mrs.  Markham  replied.  "  She  has 
far  too  much  stability,  and  is  far  too  well  prin- 
cipled for  that ;  she  would  never  hint  a  word 
in  disparagement  of  any  one  without  good 
cause." 

"  I  have  hoped  that  she  would  not  do  so, 
even  with  good  cause,"  Mrs.  "Walsingham  said, 
meditatively ;  "  but  one  never  knows  what  peo- 
ple are — never !  does  one  ?" 

"Oh,  mammal  I  can't  agree  with  you  there. 
Look  at  Claude's  wife,  for  instance.  I  read  her 
as  I  do  my  alphabet — a  wilful,  thoughtless 
flirt,  who  will  cause  him  some  awful  pangs, 


84 


ON  GUARD. 


poor  boy,  unless  he  asserts  himself,  and  breaks 
her  in  at  once." 

The  wilful,  thoughtless  flirt,  meanwhile,  had 
arrayed  herself  in  hat  and  habit  with  trembling 
fingers,  and  a  heart  that  was  beating  in  a  way 
it  had  never  beat  before.  She  was  going  out  to 
do  a  thing  on  which  her  wishes  were  no  longer 
fixed,  in  direct  defiance  of  her  husband,  in  open 
opposition  to  his  will.  Let  Devilskin  carry  her 
gallantly  as  he  might,  the  bloom  would  be  off 
the  performance.  Still  she  would  go  now,  be- 
cause Claude  had  never  asked  her  once  kindly 
to  give  it  up,  but  had  ordered  her  offensively,  at 
the  instigation,  she  supposed,  of  "  that  woman." 

Her  horse  was  very  fresh  that  morning.  He 
seemed  to  scent  sport  afar ;  and  he  carried  her 
along  to  Horsley  Hollow  in  such  a  short  space 
of  time  that  she  had  no  opportunity  of  thinking 
better  of  it.  They  were  still  drawing  the  cover 
when  she  arrived  at  the  scene  of  action.  There 
was  a  good  field  assembled ;  and  -at  a  little  dis- 
tance, drawn  up  on  an  eminence  that  command- 
ed a  wide  view  of  the  country  on  all  sides, 
there  were  a  goodly  array  of  carriages.  In  one 
of  these  Grace  Harper  sat,  looking  plump  and 
placid  as  usual,  with  her  mamma;  and  she 
nodded  in  a  friendly  way  to  Mrs.  Claude — nod- 
ded with  a  kind  smile  on  her  lips  that  blinded 
Mrs.  Claude  to  the  peculiar  nature  of  the  glance 
that  lived  in  Miss  Grace's  eyes  at  the  same 
moment. 

"  Lady  Lexley  was  just  asking  Major  Wal- 
singham  if  you  were  coming,  and  he  said  'No,'" 
Grace  said,  leaning  out  of  the  carriage  presently, 
and  addressing  Mrs.  Claude,  who  had  pulled 
her  horse  up  in  close  proximity. 

"  Did  he  ?  he  was  mistaken,  you  see.  Is 
Lady  Lexley  here?" 

"  Tes ;  she  means  to  follow,  I  believe.  Your 
husband  has  promised  to  take  care  of  her." 

Bella  shook  in  her  saddle,  for  the  first  time 
n  her  life,  on  small  provocation,  as  Miss  Harper 
aid  those  words.  This,  then,  was  the  reason 
Claude  had  not  wanted  her  out  this  day ;  he 
intended  charging  himself  with  the  care  of  that 
woman ! 

Grace  Harper  saw  that  momentary  falter,  and 
the  cause  of  it  at  the  same  moment,  and  plea- 
sure dawned  upon  her  soul.  She  had  no 
settled  plan  of  action.  She  was  malicious,  that 
was  all ;  and  if  it  came  to  her  easily  to  sting,  or 
even  to  stab,  Mrs.  Claude  "Walsingham,  to  whom 
she  for  divers  reasons  had  conceived  a  dislike, 
well  and  good !  she  would  so  sting  and  stab. 
But  she  had  no  deep  design  in  the  matter — no 
fixed,  unalterable  purpose — no  determination 
to  pursue  her  unconscious  rival  to  some  unplea- 
sant "inevitable  end."  She  was  as  guileless 
of  profound  plot  and  elaborate  scheme  as  are 
the  majority  of  commonplace  spiteful  women, 
who  will  deal  a  death-blow  to  a  sister  as  much 
in  ignorance  as  ill-temper.  Grace  Harper  would 
do  the  ill-natured  act  that  came  in  her  way,  and 
that  she  had  to  use  no  exertion  to  achieve ;  but 
she  was  no  modern  Borgia,  no  female  Machia- 
velli ;  she  could  not  look  through  a  long  vista 
of  cruel  acts  to  be  done  by  her,  and  refine  upon 
each  with  subtlety.  Thank  God,  the  women 
who  can  do  these  things  live  only  in  novels 
that  we  in  these  latter  days  look  upon  as  over- 
romantic  ! 

But,  though  no  modern  Borgia,  no  female 


Machiavelli,  she  was  quite  dangerous  enough, 
blonde,  bland  woman  that  she  was,  or  looked. 
She  was  always  counting  so  many  years  of  her 
life  as  gone,  utterly  gone  and  lost,  in  conse- 
quence of  her  having  waited  on  the  chance  of 
Claude  "Walsingham  making  her  his  wife ;  and 
though  no  more  eager-minded  ones  had  sought 
her  in  the  interim,  she  held  him  responsible  for 
her  being  Miss  Harper  still,  and  entertained 
feelings  of  sore  spite  against  the  woman  who 
had  won  the  post  for  which  she  (Grace)  had 
waited. 

When  Mrs.  Claude  "Walsingham  had  entirely 
subdued  the  sensations  which  caused  her  to 
shake  in  her  saddle,  she  resumed  the  conversa- 
tion, leaning  forward  a  little  on  the  pommel, 
and  switching  her  whip  in  a  way  she  would  not 
have  done,  had  she  been  all  herself  on  the  oc- 
casion. 

"  Oh !  she  means  to  follow,  does  she  ?  Does 
Lady  Lexley  ride  V 

Bella  asked  it  in  the  tone  one  who  believes 
herself  to  be  a  proficient  in  the  art  is  sure  to 
employ  about  one  of  whom  a  doubt  may  exist. 

"  I  believe  she  does,  well,"  Grace  replied. 
Miss  Harper  was  not  too  fond  of  her  cousin's 
flashing  wife  herself,  but  she  was  prepared  to 
extol  and  exalt  her  if  the  doing  so  could  be 
proved  to  be  disagreeable  to  Mrs.  Claude  "Wal- 
singham. 

"  Besides,  your  husband  has  promised  to  take 
care  of  her^  and  he  is  so  careful.  He's  such  a 
splendid  rider — such  a  judicious  rider — that  she 
is  sure  to  come  out  of  it  well." 

"  When  did  he  promise  ? "  Bella  asked 
sharply. 

"Yesterday,"  Miss  Harper  replied  languidly. 
"  "What  a  time  they  are  finding  to-day  1  "  she 
continued  hurriedly;  for  as  she  had  asked 
Claude  to  "  look  after  Lady  Lexley  "  the  day 
before,  she  was  anxious  to  change  the  conver- 
sation. 

"  That  accounts  for  his  being  so  cross,  and 
for  his  not  wanting  me  to  come,"  poor  Bella 
thought  disconsolately.  "  The  reason  he  gave, 
his  annoyance  at  my  tumble,  and  his  jealousy 
of  Jack,  were  all  assumed  as  a  blind."  " 

For  a  few  moments  her  colour  and  heart  sank 
very  low ;  and  had  it  not  been  for  very  shame, 
she  would  have  turned  away  from  this  enter- 
prise, in  which  her  heart  no  longer  was— have 
turned  away,  and  ridden  home  to  the  Court, 
and  bewailed  Claude's  defalcation  in  secresy 
and  silence  all  day. 

At  the  expiration  of  a  few  moments,  how- 
ever, her  colour  rose,  and  her  heart  too ;  and 
she  told  herself  that  she  could  not  go  back, 
that  it  would  not  be  compatible  with  her  dig- 
nity that  she  should  flee  the  field  literally  as 
well  as  figuratively  before  that  woman. 

"Do  you  know  where  Major  "Walsingham  is 
planted  ?  I  must  go  and  find  him,"  she  said  to 
Miss  Harper.  "  He  may  look  after  Lady  Lex- 
ley,  but  he  will  also  have  me  to  look  after 
now." 

"  He's  down  at  the  cover  side  with  the  rest," 
Miss  Harper  said,  shortly. 

"  I  wonder  is  he  with  that  group  ? "  Bella 
said,  pointing  to  a  party  of  men  whose  heads 
were  just  visible  over  a  fence  a  little  to  her 
left. 

"No;  he  went  over  there  almost  into  the 


ON  GUARD. 


85 


wood  just  now,  after  Lady  Lexley,  who  won't 
wait  quietly,  but  will  keep  on  riding  about  in 
the  most  irritating  way ;  at  least,  it  appears  to 
be  irritating  to  the  rest." 

Bella  touched  Devilskin,  and  went  off  in  the 
direction  indicated.  "  Irritating  to  the  rest," 
but  not  to  Claude  apparently ;  yet  who,  as  a 
general  rule,  could  be  more  intolerant  to  un- 
sportsman  or  womanlike  conduct  than  Claude. 
The  glamour  must  be  over  him,  his  wife  felt ; 
and  she  also  felt  that  ill  as  she  had  behaved  to 
another,  she  had  not  deserved  this — "  this  open 
neglect,"  she  called  it — at  his  hands. 

She  came  upon  the  group  in  the  midst  of 
which  her  husband  was,  very  quietly.  Two  or 
three  men  made  way  for  her,  and  recognised 
her  at  once;  but  Claude,  who  was  talking  to 
the  sole  Amazon,  Lady  Lexley,  did  not  see  her 
till  Devilskin's  head  came  in  a  line  with  his  own 
hunter's,  and  her  voice  said  close  to  his 
ear,  "  Claude,  I'm  come,  you  see ;  will  you 
take  care  of  me  too,  as  well  as  of  Lady  Lex- 
ley?" 

She  gave  a  well-intentioned  bow  that  lacked 
all  graciousness  to  her  imaginary  rival,  as  she 
spoke,  which  Lady  Lexley  acknowledged  viva- 
ciously enough.  She  had  no  feeling  towards 
Mrs.  Claude.  She  had  never  been  foolish 
enough  to  wait  on  an  uncertainty. 

"I  see  you  are;  but  that  horse  won't  carry 
you  safely,  Bella,"  Claude  answered,  as  steadi- 
ly as  his  anger  would  admit  of  his  answering. 
He  was  very  much,  very  seriously  annoyed  with 
his  wife.  He  thought  that  this  freak  of  hers 
would  tell  the  whole  story  to  the  whole  field. 
The  whole  story  of  their  conjugal  differences — 
of  his  manly  wrath  and  her  womanly  weakness. 
He  was  very  much  annoyed. 

"  I  know  my  horse's  manner  now,  and  I  feel 
sure  he  will  carry  me  safely  enough.  Any  way, 
I  shall  iry  him — unless  you  have  any  particular 
feeling  against  my  going  so." 

She  looked  at  him  with  her  eyes — those 
lovely  eyes  that  he  had  loved  so  well  when 
their  softest  glances  belonged  of  right  to  Stan- 
ley Villars,  not  to  him.  She  looked  at  him 
with  her  eyes  sparkling  with  wrath — with 
wrath  that  had  more  love  than  anger  in  it,  after 
all.  But  he  could  not  read  the  glance  aright. 
He  thought  that  she  was  defying  him,  and, 
"by  Jove !  I'll  teach  her  a  trick  worth  two  of 
that,"  he  thought,  pulling  angrily  with  one 
hand  at  his  moustache,  and  with  the  other  at 
the  grey  hunter's  curb. 

"I  have  a  particular  feeling  against  it,"  he 
replied  aloud,  coldly,  and  as  he  spoke  his  horse, 
resenting  the  heavy  hand,  plunged,  then  reared, 
till  he  almost  settled  back  on  his  haunches. 

"Oh,  Claude,  be  careful!"  Bella  cried,  all 
thoughts  of  annoyance  vanishing  in  an  instant, 
as  she  saw  him — or  thought  that  she  saw  him — 
in  danger. 

Major  Walsingham  brought  the  loaded  end  of 
his  hunting  whip  down  between  the  grey's  ears. 
He  was  displeased  with  his  wife.  It  seemed  to 
him  well  to  let  off  a  little  of  his  displeasure  on 
his  horse,  since  the  latter  had  given  him  such  a 
fair  opportunity. 

"  If  I  were  your  wife  I  would  not  let  you  ride 
a  horse  who  looks  so  viciously  out  of  the  corner 
of  his  eye  for  nothing,  in  that  way,"  Lady  Lex- 
ley  remarked,  getting  herself  and  the  even- 


minded  bay  mare  she  was  riding  well  out  of 
the  orbit  of  the  grey  hunter's  heels. 

"The  horse  is  quiet  enough.  Claude  is  teas- 
ing him  now  because "  Bella  stopped  there. 

She  had  been  about  to  add,  "because  he  is 
angry  with  me,"  but  she  saw  Claude  scowl,  and 
fancied  that  she  heard  him  swear. 

"  Whether  the  horse  be  quiet  or  not,  I  can  get 
him  under,"  Major  Walsingham  replied ;  "he's 
spirited,  but  he  is  not  an  obstinate  devil,  always 
desirous  of  doing  that  which  I  want  him  not  to 
do." 

The  two  ladies,  his  auditors,  heard  him  dis- 
tinctly. Some  men,  who  were  waiting  quietly 
near,  heard  him  also,  and  they  laughed  and 
looked  at  one  another,  for  they  had  heard  the 
words  which  had  passed  between  husband  and 
wife  when  Mrs.  Claude  rode  up.  Bella  marked 
that  they  thus  looked  and  laughed,  and  once 
again  she  shook  in  her  saddle.  Had  it  come  to 
this !  that  Claude  should  think  her  "  an  obsti- 
nate devil,"  and  imply  before  men — strange 
men,  and  above  all,  before  that  woman,  that  he 
thought  her  so  ?  Was  it  for  this,  to  be  rejected 
and  despised  by  him,  and  looked  and  laughed 
at  by  his  field  friends,  whose  very  names  were 
unknown  to  her,  that  she  had  braved  so  much 
for  Claude  Walsingham  ?  She  could  not  bear 
it.  She  could  not  be  bright  and  brave  any 
longer.  Since  he  wanted  none  of  her  companion- 
ship, she  would  go  back  again.  Her  heart  was 
bowed  down  by  those  last  words  of  his,  and  she 
no  longer  cared  to  do  battle  for  an  idea.  She 
would  beat  a  dignified  retreat  at  once,  before  he 
had  time  to  say  anything  more  that  could  be 
construed  by  these  people  into  matter  for  her 
present  and  his  future  humiliation. 

Some  such  little  phrase  as,  "  Then,  Claude,  as 
you  would  rather  I  didn't  ride  I  will  go  home," 
was  rising  to  her  lips,  when  an  energetic  man 
about  ten  yards  to  their  right  gave  the  view 
halloo,  and  presently  the  hounds  came  out  and 
swept  steadily  across  the  road  and  over  the 
opposite  hedge,  and  Markham  and  the  whole 
field  followed.  The  sight  was  too  much  for 
her.  She  could  not  say  her  little  phrase.  She 
could  not  turn  from  the  hunt  now  that  it  was 
fairly  up. 

Lady  Lexley  rode  bravely  enough  up  to  the 
fence  that  had  been  already  taken  by  a  goodly 
number,  but  her  heart  baulked  it,  and  her  mare, 
the  even-minded  bay,  speedily  followed  the  ex- 
ample of  her  heart.  "Hang  these  women!" 
Claude  thought,  impatiently,  as  he  restrained 
his  own  hunter  while  he  addressed  encouraging 
words  to  the  winsome  woman  with  whom  he 
had  charged  himself  on  the  strength  of  the  vast 
courage  she  had  displayed  in  the  field  while  it 
had  been  one  of  imagination  only.  "You'll  find 
it  a  mere  nothing.  Bella,  you  go  over  and  show 
Lady  Lexley  the  way ;  the  mare  will  follow 
Devilskin.  Sol  well  done  I"  he  cried  out  heartily, 
as  Bella  triumphantly  rose  and  landed  without 
so  much  of  a  swerve  as  would  have  spilled  a 
drop  of  water,  had  she  carried  a  cupful  in  her 
hand.  Mrs.  Claude  was  brightly  happy,  brightly 
herself  again  all  in  an  instant,  as  her  husband 
gave  that  tacit  permission  for  her  to  accompany 
him,  even  though  it  was  at  the  cost  of  rendering 
herself  useful  to  "that  woman,"  she  presently 
remembered. 

The  even-rninded  mare  saw  the  folly  of  hold- 


ing  back  the  moment  her  rider  saw  the  folly  of 
flinching  at  such  a  trifle.  She  clambered  up 
the  bank,  made  a  faint,  small  jump  through, 
rather  than  over,  the  fence,  and  came  down 
safely  with  a  sigh  into  the  field  where  Bella  sat, 
her  hand  on  Devilskin's  back,  turned  round  in 
her  saddle  to  look  at  those  who  were  coming. 
In  a  moment  Claude  came  thundering  over — 
the  grey  with  his  legs  gathered  well  up  under 
him,  his  head  stretched  out,  and  his  nostrils 
blood-red  from  excitement  at  having  been  held 
back  in  such  an  unwonted  way,  the  very  beau 
ideal  of  a  flying  leaper ;  while  Claude — Claude, 
who  came  to  the  hunt  hi  a  little  brougham  and 
a  big  grey  wrap — Claude,  who  indulged  in  the 
dandyism  of  making  it  an  important  article  in 
hunting  creed  that  he  should  start  spotless — sat 
with  his  hands  low  and  his  legs  grasping  the 
grey  hunter's  barrel  as  though  they  had  been 
of  iron ;  a  sight,  as  his  wife  thought,  to  wonder 
at  and  admire  with  a  larger  wonder  and  admi- 
ration than  a  centaur  could  have  claimed ! 

It  was  a  magnificent  leap,  magnificently 
taken,  and  Bella's  heart  bounded  with  pride,  for 
that  he  who  had  taken  it  was  all  her  own.  She 
forgave  him  his  brief  injustice ;  she  forgot  his 
temporary  neglect  as  she  had  deemed  it.  She 
only  remembered  that  he  had  gone  over  his  first 
fence  grandly,  and  that  he  was  her  own  hus- 
band, and  Lady  Lexley's  cavalier  for  this  day 
only. 

The  grey  hunter  had  come  over  gallantly,  but 
the  grey  hunter  had  a  temper  of  his  own,  and 
it  had  been  sorely  tried  before  he  had  been  suf- 
fered to  come  over.  He  was  a  horse  who  would 
always  be  first  if  he  were  allowed  to  have  his 
own  way,  and  who,  if  he  were  not  allowed  to 
have  his  own  way,  went  straight  off  into  a 
strong  fractiousness  that  required  the  subtlest 
management.  Major  Walsingham  was  not  in  the 
humour  to  bestow  subtle  management  upon  any- 
thing this  day,  for  he  was  put  out  with  his  own 
wife,  and  with  Lord  Lexley's  wife  also.  He  had 
not  been  a  free  agent  precisely  in  this  matter  of 
having  her  ladyship  left  upon  his  hands  ;  she  had 
been  foisted  upon  him  by  the  judicious  Miss 
Harper.  Foisted  upon  him  so  cleverly,  that  he 
could  not  say  for  the  life  of  him  how  it  came 
about. 

The  whole  field  were  ahead  of  them  now. 
These  women  !  these  women !  what  they  were 
costing  him  !  Through  them  he  might  miss  the 
rare  felicity  of  catching  sight  of  the  extreme  tip 
of  the  brush  of  the  fox.  "  I  wish  to  God  you 
had  stayed  at  home,  Bella!"  he  said,  riding 
close  up  to  her ;  "can't  you  propose  to  her  "  (he 
indicated  Lady  Lexley  by  a  movement  of  his 
head) — can't  you  propose  to  her,  presently,  that 
you  two  go  off  back,  and  see  what  you  can  of  it 
by  keeping  along  the  roads  ?" 

"I  hate  keeping  along  the  roads,"  Bella  re- 
plied, shortly,  "  you  needn't  lag  behind  for  me, 
Claude ;  don't  be  afraid  for  me,  I'll  not  go  at 
anything  I'm  a  bit  doubtful  of." 

"But  I'm  doubtful  about  her,"  Claude  re- 
plied. 

"Then  let  her  go  back,"  Bella  said  scorn- 
folly  ;  "  but  I'm  not  going  back  with  her!" 

"  Come  along  then ;  we  shall  catch  them  up 
at  the  brook — half  of  them  will  fall  away 
there,"  Claude  said,  testily  touching  his  horse 
with  the  spur  as  he  spoke,  and  they  all  three 


went  along  accordingly — the  grey,  despite 
Claude's  strenuous  endeavours  to  keep  him  in,  a 
good  length  ahead. 

They  were  riding  pretty  well,  at  racing 
speed,  and  the  pace  soon  brought  them  close 
upon  the  brook  to  which  Claude  had  alluded.  It 
was  a  brook  so  broad  that  it  would  have  been 
called  a  river  in  some  counties  that  are  not  too 
well  watered.  "Where  the  fox  had  crossed,  it 
was  from  eighteen  to  nineteen  feet  wide. 

Mr.  Markham  himself  had  ridden  along  the 
bank  on  the  left-hand  side  to  a  spot  where  the 
brook  narrowed  itself  to  a  mere  ditch  for  a 
couple  of  hundred  yards,  and  thither  all  the  more 
precautions  spirits  were  following  him.  But 
Jack,  and  two  or  three  others,  had  gone  over 
without  hesitation  at  the  part  where  the  fox 
had  crossed,  and  Claude,  after  telling  his  wife 
and  Lady  Lexley  to  "follow  Markham,"  went 
at  it  without  hesitation  too. 

An  ugly  spirit  had  taken  possession  of  the 
grey.  He  had  tasted  freely  of  the  whip  and 
spur  this  morning,  and  he  had  been  held  back 
and  otherwise  maltreated.  He  was  one  of 
those  horses  with  more  white  corner  than  pupil 
to  their  eyes,  who  are  prone  to  lose  their  tem- 
pers and  not  recover  them  again  speedily.  He 
had  also  had  a  bad  example  set  him  just  now 
by  the  even-minded  mare,  whose  quick  sym- 
pathy with  her  rider  had  induced  her  to  baulk 
her  leap.  Horses  follow  a  bad  example  with  as 
fatal  a  precision,  very  often,  as  the  most  intelli- 
gent human  being  can  do.  The  grey  hunter 
did  now.  Claude  rode  him  straight  at  that 
portion  of  the  brook  over  which  the  pluckier 
portion  of  the  field  had  crossed  in  the  wake  of 
the  fox  and  hounds,  and  when  he  seemed  to  be 
about  to  rise  to  it,  he  baulked,  wheeled  round, 
and  burst  into  a  gallop. 

Only  for  a  moment.  Claude  had  him  in 
hand,  and  he  was  brought  round  and  put  at  it 
again  with  a  deep  dig  from  the  spurs  on  either 
side,  and  a  swift  shower  of  blows  on  his  near 
shoulder.  He  was  put  at  it,  and  held  to  it  with 
hands  of  iron,  with  hands  so  firm,  and  strong, 
and  hard,  that  though  he  would  have  burst  his 
heart  to  baulk  again,  he  could  not. 

Major  Walsingham  had  the  satisfaction  of 
feeling  during  the  two  or  three  seconds  that  he 
was  riding  at,  and  then  rising  to  the  leap,  that 
he  had  conquered  the  grey's  set  purpose  not  to 
take  it.  The  horse  rushed  at  it  with  fury,  rose 
at  it  like  the  very  demon  of  strength,  fell  short 
of  the  bank  on  the  opposite  side,  rolled  over, 
and — whirr-r-r!  there  was  a  wild  singing  of 
waters  in  Major  Walsingham's  ears — a  horrible 
rushing  up  of  mud,  and  crushing  down  of  horse 
and  saddle  upon  him — a,  maddening  entangle- 
ment of  his  own  with  a  horse's  limbs,  with  a 
hundred  horses'  limbs,  all  kicking  and  plunging 
and  bruising  him  most  horribly — a  moment  of 
wild  joy  as  he  came  out  of  these  difficulties, 
and  breathed,  and  saw,  and  realised  what  had 
happened — a  sinking  back  again,  and  then  a 
blank.  Claude  "Walsingham  was  at  the  bottom 
of  the  brook,  held  down  there,  entangled  with 
one  leg  under  the  body  of  the  grey  hunter,  who 
was  writhing  in  the  death  agonies  caused  by  a 
broken  back. 

He  was  lying  there,    senseless,   incapable. 
The  hunt  meanwhile  was  streaming  on,  uncon        \ 
scious  of  that  which  had  befallen  him. 


ON  GUARD. 


CHAPTER  XXVII. 


LITERARY  LIFE. 


MR.  STANLEY  YILLARS  read  Mrs.  Claude  "Wal- 
singham's  letter  carefully  and  thoroughly.  He 
read  all  that  she  had  written  in  it,  and  a  great 
deal  more  besides. 

So !  it  had  come  then,  this  hour  which  he  had 
dreaded  in  his  better  moments,  and  half  hoped 
for  in  his  wilder  ones  of  sorrow  and  despair. 
She  had  found  out  that  old  things  are  best. 
She  had  turned  from  her  husband  to  him — her 
first  love — her  true  friend.  All  the  anguish 
had  not  been  his,  as  he  had  thought  that  it  had 
been  when  sitting,  working  wearily  hour  after 
hour,  with  no  heart  in  the  work  he  was  en- 
gaged upon — no  heart  for  anything  that  was 
not  past  and  gone.  The  anguish  had  not  been 
all  his.  That  poor  girl,  who  had  been  taught 
by  a  traitor  to  wrong  him,  had  had  no  small 
share  of  it  before  ever  she  penned  a  letter  bear- 
ing the  faintest  semblance  of  an  appeal  to  him. 
This  he  knew — of  this  he  felt  sure  from  the 
bottom  of  his  heart. 

Thus  his  mind  ran  on  from  selfish  sorrow  to 
selfish  triumph  for  "  that  he  had  known  so  well 
how  it  would  be,"  for  a  few  minutes.  Then 
the  better  spirit — the  normal  spirit — resumed 
its  sway,  and  he  put  the  dark  distrust  away 
from  him,  and  told  himself  that  there  was  no 
more  in  the  letter  than  was  down  in  black  and 
white,  and  that  he  was  a  hound  to  have  hoped 
that  there  was  for  a  moment.  It  was  what  it 
purported  to  be — a  glad  reminder  to  him  that 
Claude  and  Bella  remembered  him,  and  wished 
to  see  him  once  again. 

He  sat  twirling  it  between  his  fingers — that 
little  letter  that  had  been  written  in  such  pain — 
picturing  the  scene  to  himself  in  which  it  had 
been  penned.  It  was  from  the  country  house 
of  Claude's  father.  Ah!  doubtless  all  the 
family  were  about  her  as  she  wrote,  hearing 
any  phrase  that  occurred  to  her  as  "  neat,"  for 
Bella  was  wont  to  review  herself  favourably  as 
she  indited  an  epistle,  and  to  make  all  present 
sharers,  as  far  as  their  lights  would  lead  them, 
in  the  satisfaction  she  derived  from  the  turning 
of  any  sentence.  Probably  Claude  had  been 
sitting  by  her,  too,  in  the  spoony  way  young 
married  people  have.  This  was  a  remarkably 
pleasant  part  of  the  picture.  He  looked  away 
from  it  back  into  the  letter. 

No ;  the  letter  had  not  been  penned  blithely 
in  family  conclave.  There  were  no  remem- 
brances from  Claude,  and  meaningless  as  re- 
membrances ever  are  in  epistolary  communica- 
tions, still  he  knew  they  would  have  been  sent 
had  Claude  been  cognizant  of  her  writing. 
That  expression  too — "  You  promised  to  come 
to  me,  did  I  ever  need  you.  I  need  you  now, 
and  you  are  not  one  to  break  a  promise !"  For 
what  could  his  lost  bride — the  young  wife  of 
his  friend — "  need  him,"  if  her  husband  were 
the  friend  and  fastness,  the  succour  and  support 
to  her,  that  Stanley  had  always  feared  Claude 
would  not  be  ? 

It  was  a  dangerous  subject  to  think  out. 
fhe  man  who  had  lost  faith,  friends,  and 
love  at  one  fell  blow,  had  not  lost  a  jot  or 
tittle  of  his  honour.  Still  it  was  a  dangerous 
subject  to  dwell  upon,  for  unruly  ideas  respect- 


ing "what 
trude. 


87 


might  be    going  on"   would  ob- 


At  first  he  decided  upon  not  answering  her 
letter  in  anyway.  Situated  as  he  now  was, 
he  could  not  befriend  her,  and  his  struggles 
would  only  pain  her.  But  this  decision  lasted 
only  for  one  day;  at  the  end  of  which  he 
resolved  that,  though  he  would  not  write,  he 
would  call  when  they  came  to  town.  On  this 
resolve  he  tried  to  put  aside  the  subject,  and 
work ;  but  he  found  that  he  could  not  work  on 
it ;  so  after  a  while  he  came  to  the  conclusion 
that  early  next  week  he  would  write,  and  then 
call.  Having  definitely  fixed  on  a  plan  of 
action,  he  went  to  work  with  a  will  again ;  for 
the  conviction  smote  him  that  next  week 
would  find  him  very  restless,  and  incapable  of 
running  in  harness;  so  he  went  and  ground 
away  at  his  popular  "Early  Fathers"  series, 
till  he  had  the  satisfaction  of  feeling  that 
he  was  at  least  two  weeks  in  advance  of  the 
printers. 

In  addition  to  his  serial  labours,  he  had  been 
engaged  on  a  noyel  —  a  regular,  orthodox, 
three- volume  novel  —  to  the  last  pages  of  the 
last  volume  of  which  he  was  putting  the  finish- 
ing strokes.  As  it  was  to  be  published  with- 
out his  name — as  "by  the  author  of"  some 
great  success  could  not  stand  on  its  title-page — 
as  it  had  no  "plot"  properly  so  called — as 
there  was  no  one  prominent  male  or  female 
figure  in  it — above  all,  as  it  was  uncommonly 
like  real  life,  and  not  at  all  breath-catching — 
his  publisher  was  very  despondent  about  it; 
and  so  in  the  nature  of  things  Stanley  Villars 
was  rather  despondent  too. 

Still  it  was  one  of  those  things  which,  when 
commenced,  must  be  concluded.  Like  Franken- 
stein, our  own  creations  continually  overcome 
and  rule  us  absolutely  with  an  iron  sway,  that 
we  cannot  rebel  against.  "We  gloat  upon  them 
unctuously  at  first,  in  joy  at  having  conceived 
them  at  all ;  and  in  return  they  loom  upon  us 
at  all  sorts  of  unexpected  times  when  we  do 
not  want  them  so  to  loom,  and  frighten  away 
all  peace,  and  shadow  over  every  moment  of 
what  would  otherwise  be  relaxation. 

Stanley  was  putting  the  last  strokes  to  his 
first  novel  in  the  days  when  we  meet  him 
again ;  and  how  he  hated  his  work !  The 
darkest  detestation  for  it  had  obtained  posses- 
sion of  his  soul,  and  had  it  not  been  for  the 
money  that  he  was  to  get  upon  it,  and  for  the 
money  that  he  had  had  upon  it,  he  would  have 
put  every  page  of  it  in  the  fire,  and  felt  him- 
self the  better  for  having  done  so.  As  it  was, 
the  unfinished  work  was  another  man's  pro- 
perty— paid  for  in  coin  of  the  realm ;  therefore, 
Stanley  knew  that  he  must  finish  it. 

He  had  no  particular  hero  in  it,  and  no  par- 
ticular plot,  as  I  have  said.  It  was  more  a 
series  of  society  scenes,  strung  together  on  a 
loose  kind  of  thread,  that  ran  through  the 
volumes,  and  that  might  as  well  have  been 
absent  for  any  intrinsic  value  that  it  had,  than 
a  novel,  as  a  novel  is  generally  understood. 
He  had  been  a  sharp  observer  of  men  and 
manners,  of  women  and  the  ways  of  the  world, 
from  his  boyhood.  His  sharp  observations  were 
useful  to  him  in  a  measure  now  that  he  was 
thrown  upon  his  own  devices,  but  the  power 
of  stringing  incongruous  impossibilities  toge- 


U1N     U  U  AiXJJ. 


ther  euphoniously  would  have  been  more  use- 
ful still. 

His  characters  were  very  unmanageable  after 
reading  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham's  letter.  Pre- 
viously he  had  been  going  on  without  hesita- 
tion, causing  the  evil  to  flourish  like  a  green 
bay  tree,  and  making  virtue  its  own  and  sole 
reward  in  the  gloomiest  and  most  cynical  man- 
ner. But  he  felt  a  better  man  himself  after 
reading  that  veiled  appeal  that  she  whom  he 
had  loved  so  well  and  so  unwisely  had  made 
to  him.  He  felt  himself  to  be  a  better  man ; 
consequently  he  desired  to  put  better  thoughts 
into  it,  to  attribute  better  motives  to  the  chil- 
dren of  his  brain. 

He  desired  to  do  this — earnestly  he  desired 
it.  Trivial  as  the  matter  may  appear  to  those 
who  have  never  sought  to  give  publicity  to  the 
creatures  of  their  imagination,  the  things  we 
create — the  things  to  which  we  endeavour  to 
give  form  and  substance — are  not  trivial  to  us. 
We  put  a  considerable  portion  of  our  current 
hopes  and  fears,  sorrows,  despairs,  aspirations, 
into  them.  They  ebb  and  flow  very  often  with 
our  own  life-tide  in  a  way  that  the  casual  read- 
er, who  knows  not — who  thinks  not — who  cares 
not — how  books  are  "done,"  no  more  under- 
stands or  appreciates  than  does  the  dog  who 
lies  beside  me  at  this  moment ;  or  than  Rock 
did — solemn- faced,  faithful  Rock — who  had  re- 
mained wkh  Stanley  Villars  through  weal  and 
woe,  and  certainly  not  suffering  in  the  flesh  yet 
through  his  fidelity. 

For  days  after  the  receipt  of  that  letter  on 
chat  bleak  March  morning,  Stanley  Villars  de- 
voted himself  to  literature  unceasingly,  ex- 
clusively, with  a  sore  foreboding  that  disturbing, 
distracting  elements  were  about  to  arise  and 
mar  the  unvarying  obnoxious  routine  of  his  life. 
We  all — or,  at  least,  most  of  us  do — conjure  up 
a  picture  at  the  sound  of  those  words,  "a  life 
devoted  to  literature."  A  charming  one  was 
mine  for  years — painted  in  the  glowing  tints  of 
youth — a  hero-worshipping  temperament,  and 
an  imagination  unspoilt  through  being  untried. 
It  was  gorgeously  framed  and  glazed.  It  was 
something  like  this  to  look  upon:— 

He  (the  litterateurs  of  ray  imagination  were 
always  men — my  mental  vision  of  women  "who 
write  "  was  not  a  pretty  one)  was  usually  in  a 
study ;  if  he  was  not  in  a  study,  he  was  away 
in  the  country,  in  a  leafy  alley  of  a  large  forest, 
where  nobody  had  ever  been  before,  on  the 
back  of  a  tall,  black  horse,  with  fiery  eyes  and 
flowing  tail.  I  was  very  particular  as  to  the 
fiery  eyes  and  flowing  tail.  Common  mortals, 
to  my  certain  knowledge,  rode  horses  who  were 
not  possessed  of  these  luxurious  attributes ;  but 
I  never  mounted  an  author  on  anything  more 
possible  than  a  jet  black  steed,  with  glowing 
orbs,  and  a  tail  like  a  pennon,  always  flying 
out  gallantly,  not  to  say  wildly. 

He  was  pleasanter  in  my  eyes  in  a  study, 
though — a  study  that  contained  all  the  books  in 
the  world  (which,  in  those  days,  meant  only  all 
the  books  of  which  I  had  heard — the  library 
would  not  have  been  extensive  by  any  means). 
He  was  rarely  reading  those  books.  Ordinarily, 
I  painted  him  holding  a  quill  pen  with  an  un- 
sullied broad  feather  handle,  such  as  Charles 
Dickens  is  represented  as  holding  fn  one  of  his 
earlier  portraits ;  and  he  was  often  giving  audi- 


ence, with  indifference  on  his  noble  brow,  and 
suppressed  scorn  on  his  haughty  lip,  to  the 
grandest  of  earth's  creatures ! 

If  he  was  not  giving  audience  to  these  kings 
and  queens,  and  such  like,  who  I  always  de- 
picted prostrate  before  him,  and  deferentially 
delighted  at  being  there  at  all ;  if  he  was  not 
giving  audience  to  these,  he  was  surrounded  by 
the  loftier  creatures  of  his  own  ilk.  This  last 
was  the  most  glorious  canvas  I  ever  covered — 
a  chaos  of  mighty  writers,  of  books,  of  statuar}', 
of  pictures,  all  in  the  widest  frames,  and  all,  I 
believe,  by  Leonardo  da  Vinci.  I  having  read  a 
story  of  that  master  in  my  earliest  childhood, 
which  took  my  fancy  much. 

I  never  imagined  such  men  marrying,  and 
going  out  to  dinner,  or  doing  anything  in  fact 
as  common  mortals  do.  They  were  gods  to  me, 
and  what  a  world  my  worship  for  them  made. 
What  a  golden  land  I  discovered  and  peopled — 
how  largely  I  travelled  in  it,  crouching  over  a 
fire  in  the  semi-darkness  of  full  many  a  winter's 
afternoon — lying  under  the  trees  in  the  sun-- 
beams through  many  a  long  summer  day — in 
that  by-gone  time  when  I  bent  the  knees  of  my 
heart  in  unfeigned  homage  to  those  who  led  "  a 
literary  life." 

Idle  dreams  I  Unreal  scenes !  A  sad  wasting 
of  the  time  God  gave  me  to  apply  to  some  bet- 
ter purpose !  Maybe  they  were  all  these  things ; 
but  they  gave  me  hours  of  such  joy  that  not  the 
knowledge  of  the  mad  ignorance  which  gilded 
them  can  tarnish  now.  Nor  were  the  dreams 
more  idle,  the  scenes  more  unreal,  the  wasting 
of  time  more  reprehensible,  than  are  the  dreams, 
and  the  scenes,  and  the  time  that  are  paid  for 
and  read  in  post  octavo  now. 

For  days  after  the  receipt  of  that  letter  from 
Bella,  Stanley  Villars  devoted  himself  to  litera- 
ture unceasingly.  The  bleak  March  wind  howl- 
ed melodiously  past  his  windows,  and  the  hot 
March  sun  streamed  through  the  same,  and  still 
he  would  not  quit  the  task  he  had  assigned 
himself,  and  go  out  to  breathe  that  air  and  take 
that  exercise  which  the  habits  of  his  former  life 
rendered  a  necessity  for  him.  He  wrote  on  and 
on  till  deep  marks  came  into  his  face,  till  his 
temples  grew  pinched,  till  his  mouth  took  that 
hard  line  which  speaks  more  frequently  of  ill- 
condition  than  ill-temper,  till  his  blood-shot 
eyes  almost  refused  to  recognise  the  faithful 
dog  who,  on  his  part,  looked  at  his  master  with 
the  trembling  of  fearful  love. 

He  had  not  taken  any  account  of  time  lately. 
He  had  gone  on  hour  after  hour,  till  his  fingers 
had  stiffened,  and  then  he  had  thrown  down  his 
pen,  and  bent  his  head  down  upon  his  arms  on 
the  table,  till  his  hand  could  regain  its  cunning. 
He  had  not  taken  any  account  of  time.  His 
head  and  his  mind  were  hot  and  weary,  when 
at  last  his  landlady  came  to  him  and  told  him 
that  "  such  goings  on  she  had  no  patience  with ; 
he  had  not  been  to  bed  for  a  week,  nor  eaten 
sufficient  to  keep  the  breath  in  the  body  of  an 
infant." 

"I  am  going  to  give  overwork  for  a  little 
time — for  a  day  or  two,"  he  replied ;  "  and  I 
think  I  will  have  something  to  eat  now  before 
I  go  out." 

There  was  a  singing  in  his  ears,  and  a  pain 
in  the  back  of  his  head,  to  say  nothing  of  a  cord 
of  blood  behind  the  ball  of  each  eye.  The 


ON  GUARD. 


89 


d  appeared  to  be  contained  in  his  brain, 
and  all  its  business  to  be  transacting  there.  In 
a  word,  the  man  was  nearly  broken  down.  All 
you  who  can  write  can  comprehend  his  sensa- 
tions. 

His  landlady  was  a  kind-hearted  woman, 
blessed  with  a  healthy  appetite  for  animal  food. 
It  was  about  two  o'clock  in  the  middle  of  the 
day  when  she  came  to  him,  remonstrating  with 
him  on  his  state.  At  half-past  two  she  brought 
him  viands  that  she  judged  would  improve  the 
same — a  large  beef-steak  that  was  very  red 
when  cut,  floating  in  a  red  sea  of  gravy.  A 
fine  high-flavoured  cabbage,  and  a  couple  of 
smiling  potatoes,  reposed  on  another  dish.  Al- 
together it  was  a  dinner  that  her  experience  of 
former  hungry  lodgers  taught  her  to  believe 
would  be  most  acceptable.  She  smiled  as  she 
uncovered  it ;  and  then  a  certain  aching  some- 
thing in  his  chest  sank  lower ;  more  business 
was  transacted  in  his  brain,  and  he  moved  away 
in  loathing.  Like  a  worn-out  hunter,  he  was 
turning  his  nose  up  at  his  corn. 

"  I  couldn't  touch  a  bit  of  anything,  Mrs. 
Green,  to  save  my  life,"  he  said,  deprecatingly ; 
"  it's  very  nice,  I  am  sure,  but  do  take  it  away. 
Rock  and  I  will  go  out  and  see  what  the  air 
will  do  for  us." 

"  Going  out  on  an  empty  stomach  is  digging 
your  own  grave,  Mr.  Yillars,  in  your  state:  it 
is,  sir,"  she  remonstrated. 

He  was  very  weak.  He  felt  miserably  that 
he  was  very  weak  indeed,  as  he  rose  up  and 
got  his  hat,  and  threw  a  plaid  over  his  shoulders. 
Still  he  could  not  eat.  There  was  something 
very  wrong  with  him,  he  feared,  for  he  could 
not  recollect  clearly  whether  or  not  the  time 
had  arrived  when  he  was  to  call  on  the  Wal- 
singhams. 

His  landlady,  watching  him  with  pitying 
eyes,  saw  him  catch  sight  of  himself  in  the 
glass,  and  start.  Small  wonder  that  he  started. 
The  face  of  which  he  caught  a  glimpse  was  so 
haggard,  so  altered,  that  he  did  not  know  it  for 
his  own. 

"  I  think  if  you  would  give  me  a  little  brandy, 
Mrs.  Green,  it  would  string  me  up  for  a  walk," 
he  said,  trying  to  smile,  and  failing,  as  business 
was  transacted  faster  and  more  furiously  still  in 
his  brain. 

Mrs.  Green  made  some  shadow  of  a  protest 
against  the  brandy  being  taken  on  an  empty 
stomach,  but  he  overruled  her,  and  took  it,  and 
then  went  out,  Rock  at  his  heels,  with  the  pain 
in  his  chest  slightly  heightened,  and  the  panic 
in  his  head  increased. 

He  was  careless  as  to  whither  he  went. 
"What  matter  where,  so  long  as  he  got  air  to 
lighten  that  oppression  which  had  come  over 
him!  He  did  not  want  to  go  to  "Oxford 
Street,"  "the  Bank,"  or  "the  Strand;"  in 
vaguely  avoiding  either  of  these  three  places, 
he  got  away  somewhere  near  the  Regent's  Park 
— not  into  it,  but  amidst .  those  pretty  Swiss 
cottages  that  line  some  of  the  streets  in  the 
vicinity. 

He  became  conscious  of  a  great  lightness — a 
lightness  that  seemed  to  be  lifting  him  from  the 
earth.  Trouble  and  the  ground  fell  away  from 
him  at  the  same  moment ;  the  next,  Rock  stood 
whining  piteously  over  the  fallen  form  of  his 
master. 


About  the  same  hour  that  he  fell,  crushed  by 
the  weight  of  so  many  things,  Florence  rose 
superior  to  her  surroundings,  and  fought  her 
way  to  her  brother's  lodgings.  She  found  out 
his  address  from  a  clerk  at  the  ofi&ce  of  the 
magazine  for  which  he  wrote,  and  then  wended 
her  way  there  to  see  him,  and  tell  him  that  she 
"  had  stood  it  long  enough ;  that  the  dull  void 
his  absence  had  made  in  her  heart  must  be 
filled  up ;  that  he  must  not  cut  himself  off  from 
her  at  any  rate  any  longer."  She  listened  to 
the  pitiful  tale  his  landlady  told  of  long  hours 
of  unceasing  toil,  with  tears  in  her  eyes.  She 
read  the  pages  of  MS.,  the  pages  of  that  novel 
over  which  he  had  broken  down,  with  avidity 
and  pride,  tempered  with  reverence  and  awe, 
for  it  seemed  to  her  a  stupendous  work  of  ge- 
nius— a  thing  to  be  eulogised  in  reviews,  and 
read  by  the  world,  and  to  remunerate  the  writ- 
er thereof  at  such  a  rate  as  should  ensure  him 
silken  splendour  for  the  rest  of  his  days.  She 
waited  less  impatiently  after  reading  these. 
She  imagined  the  landlady,  with  the  tales  of 
his  pallor  and  weakness,  to  be  merely  a  croak- 
ing old  woman.  She  went  away  even  happily 
at  last  when  it  was  time  for  her  to  go  back  to 
dinner,  firmly  convinced  that  Stanley  was  only 
dwelling  in  seclusion  till  he  should  shine  out 
the  star  of  his  family.  Went  away,  leaving  a 
tender  little  note  for  him,  beseeching  him  to 
write  to  her,  and  say  when  she  might  come 
again,  and  that  he  was  not  angry  with  her  tor 
having  come  once.  "Went  away  home  and 
made  her  sister-in-law  prick  up  her  ears  by  the 
rapturous  way  in  which  she  gave  selected  sen- 
tences from  those  pages  which  she  had  read 
surreptitiously,  just  about  the  same  time  that 
Rock  stood  whining  over  her  fallen  brother 
Stanley's  body. 

He  had  staggered  and  fallen  in  a  secluded 
spot.  That  is  to  say,  in  comparatively  a  se- 
cluded spot,  for  one  that  was  so  near — more 
than  that,  that  was  a  portion  of — this,  the 
modern  Babylon.  It  was  a  raised  footpath — 
an  unpaved  footpath — on  which  the  worn-out 
man  of  letters  had  laid  him  down  low  in  a 
swoon,  from  which  he  might  recover  if  prompt- 
ly discovered,  or  out  of  which  he  might  ebb 
into  eternity  without  pain,  if  mercifully  left 
undiscovered  by  fate  and  a  passer-by. 

It  was  a  pitiful  position  !  Pitiful,  that  is,  to 
recount  and  think  about.  He  had  been  so 
petted  a  son,  so  worshipped  a  brother,  so  once 
favoured  a  man,  in  having  the  love  of  Bella 
Vane.  Now  he  was  alone — down,  half  dead, 
on  the  cold,  dusty  ground — uncared  for,  as  any 
tramp  might  have  been,  with  none  near  that 
was  dear  to  him — none  to  whom  ho  was  dear 
— alone  in  the  world,  and  liable,  to  all  appear- 
ance, to  drift  out  of  it  without  much  further 
notice. 

Stay  I  I  wrong  one  grievously  in  saying 
that  he  was  utterly  alone  and  deserted,  far  from 
every  one  who  was  dear  to  him,  and  to  whom 
he  was  dear.  Rock  was  left  to  him,  and  there 
was  love — love  that  may  not  be  passed  even  by 
the  love  of  woman,  in  the  way  in  which  Rock 
lifted  up  his  voice  and  wept. 

With  one  massive  paw  laid  with  the  light- 
ness of  love,  or  a  feather,  on  the  chest  of  the 
prostrate  .man ;  with  one  eye's  soft  intelligence 
bent  eagerly  on  Stanley's  face,  and  the  other 


glancing  away  earnestly  on  the  road  by  which 
succour  might  perchance  arrive  ;  with  his  long 
thoughtful  nose  elevated,  ready  to  sniff  the  first 
arrival;  with  the  deepest  notes  of  which  his 
mighty  chest  was  capable,  brought  into  play 
for  the  purpose  of  arresting  any  who  might  pass 
by.  Rock  waited,  waited,  as  only  a  dog  or  a 
woman  can  wait — hoping  for  no  praise,  expect- 
ant of  no  reward,  anxious  only  to  serve  the 
one  to  whom  he  paid  glad  tribute  of  loving 
duty.  There  was  no  motive  beyond  the  pure 
and  simple  one  of  striving  to  save.  He  was 
only  a  dog ! 

So  Rock,  in  common  with  several  others  of 
the  characters  of  this  poor  story,  was  on  guard, 
where  we  leave  him  for  awhile,  to  go  back  to 
the  brook,  at  the  bottom  of  which  his  former 
mistress's  husbancfrvas  lying  when  last  we  saw 
him  in  these  pages. 


CHAPTER  XXVHI. 

VARIOUS  TYPES  OF  MINISTERING  ANGELS. 

IT  was  a  mere  ditch,  and  Devilskin  had  taken 
it  easily  in  his  stride.  Mrs.  Claude  "Walsingham 
checked  him  when  he  was  over,  in  order  to  look 
round  and  see  how  her  companion  came  off. 
While  pausing,  she  leant  back  with  her 
hand  on  her  horse's  near  flank,  which  po- 
sition enabled  her  to  command  the  brook 
along  to  the  spot  where  Claude  should  have 
crossed. 

The  bay  mare  got  over  somehow  or  other, 
and  Lady  Lexley  was  still  in  the  saddle — or 
rather  was  still  on  high,  between  the  crupper 
and  the  mane.  Bella  did  not  stay  to  criticise 
the  way  in  which  "  that  woman  had  sat  it." 
She  had  missed  Claude. 

"  Where  can  he  be  ?"  she  cried,  as  Lady  Lex- 
ley  came  up. 

"  Whom  do  you  mean  ?"  Lady  Lexley  asked, 
adjusting  herself  as  well  as  she  could  to  the 
intricacies  of  the  pummels  again,  and  trying  to 
persuade  her  habit  to  fall  in  classical  folds,  which 
it  would  not. 

"  My  husband — why 1"  Bella  did  not 

stay  to  finish  her  sentence ;  she  was  off  along 
the  rough  bank  of  the  brook,  for  she  had  seen 
something  come  up  to  the  surface  that  might  be 
a  horse's  head,  or  a  man's  hat,  or  anything  in 
fact ;  all  she  knew  was,  that  it  was  quite  enough 
to  alarm  her. 

As  she  galloped  down  to  the  spot — blessings 
now  on  that  long  stride  of  Devilskin's  that 
covered  so  much  ground ! — she  caught  sight  of 
a  straggler,  a  man  who  had  been  thrown  out 
through  his  horse  falling  lame,  within  hailing 
distance.  She  hailed  him  accordingly,  and  he 
knocked  out  what  little  wind  there  still  was  left 
in  his  horse,  and  reached  the  place  where  the 
broken  bank  and  the  turbulent  waters  told 
their  own  tale — reached  it  as  soon  as  Bella  her- 
self. 

It  all  happened  very  quickly.  Lady  Lexley, 
riding  gently  in  Bella's  wake  on  the  even-mind- 
ed mare,  saw  Mrs.  Claude  slide  down  from  her 
saddle,  rush  to  the  brook,  and  feebly  dabble  her 
hands  in  it  in  a  frantic  manner.  Poor  Bella ! 
she  knew  her  husband  was  there,  and  in  some 


wild  way  she  entertained  hopes  of  fishing  him 
out  herself. 

Then  the  straggler,  who  had  been  thrown  out, 
came  to  the  aid  of  the  unpractical  wife,  and  at 
the  cost  of  spoiling  his  "  pink"  for  ever,  and  of 
dimming  the  polish  of  his  boots  for  a  while, 
went  in,  with  the  greatest  gallantry,  up  to  his 
waist,  and  after  two  or  three  slippery  efforts 
that  were  failures,  succeeded  in  bringing  a  very 
sodden  Claude  Walsingham  to  the  bank  where 
Bella  knelt,  with  her  face  white,  and  her  eyes 
protruding  from  their  sockets,  in  an  agony  of  ex- 
citement. 

There  was  help  to  be  'had  at  no  great  dis- 
tance, for  the  brook  was  not  far  from  that  ele- 
vation of  the  road  where  the  carriages  were, 
and  thither  Lady  Lexley  rode  to  ask  assist- 
ance of  the  Harpers.  While  she  was  away, 
Bella  knelt  very  quietly  by  the  motionless  form 
of  the  man  with  whom  she  had  been  so  angry 
but  a  short  hour  before — of  the  man  she  loved 
so  well — of  the  man  who  might  be  dead. 

She  knelt  by  him  very  quietly,  making  no 
moan  that  sounded  beyond  the  immediate  pre- 
cincts of  her  heart — touching  the  straggler  im- 
mensely by  the  intensity  of  her  silent  sorrow, 
as  well  as  by  the  futility,  not  to  say  imprudence 
of  the  attempts  she  was  making  to  resuscitate 
the  man  whose  place  that  warm-hearted  strag- 
gler would  have  taken  to  spare  that  lady  pain. 
Wiping  his  brow,  and  kissing  his  hand,  and 
looking  down !  down !  upon  those  closed  lids,  in 
wild  desire  to  know  whether  still  a  soul  was 
there  to  animate  the  eyes  those  hUte  concealed  ? 

The  time — it  was  very  brief— during  which 
Lady  Lexley  was  away  seeking  for  help,  seem- 
ed an  eternity  Jo  Bella.  When  the  help  came, 
it  was  in  the  person  of  the  placid  Miss  Harper, 
whose  mamma,  having  a  horror  of  "corpses, 
and  accidents,  and  such  things,"  had  discreetly 
vacated  her  seat  in  the  carriage,  and  deputed 
her  daughter  to  do  all  that  was  kind  to  any  one 
who  might  be  hurt. 

Miss  Harper's  face  lost  its  placidity  when  the 
carriage  stopped,  and  she,  leaning  out  to  look, 
saw  the  face  of  the  man  to  whom  this  hurt, 
that  they  could  not  gauge,  had  come.  It  lost 
its  placidity  then,  and  it  gained  another  look— a 
spiteful  look,  that  was  still  dashed  slightly  with 
sorrow — when  she  caught  sight  of  that  man's 
wife.  So,  but  for  that  wife,  might  she,  Grace, 
have  knelt  and  sobbed  and  suffered  with  a  right ! 
She  could  not  pity  Bella  for  her  agony ;  she 
could  not  sympathise  in  Bella's  sorrow;  she 
could  only  feel  sore  and  partially  avenged.  Sore, 
that  another  woman  had  the  better  right  to  be- 
tray grief  than  herself;  avenged,  by  cause  for 
that  grief  being  given. 

They  lifted  soaked,  insensible  Claude  into 
the  carriage,  and  the  two  women,  Grace  Harper 
and  Claude's  wife,  stepped  in  after  him,  and  put 
themselves  into  impossible  positions  in  order 
that  he  might  rest  softly  and  well.  Lady  Lexley 
proposed  getting  in  too,  and  "  holding  his  head 
steady,  poor  fellow !  or  doing  anything  you  tell 
me,  dear!"  she  said  to  Bella.  On  which  Bella 
roused  herself  abruptly  from  her  silent  grief, 
and  snubbed  Lady  Lexley  ruthlessly ;  then 
turned,  with  the  acumen  women  are  apt  to  dis- 
play on  such  occasions,  to  the  big  blonde  whom 
she  did  not  distrust.  So  Lady  Lexley  rode  be- 
hind them,  sorrowfully  and  sympathetically; 


ON  GUARD. 


91 


endeavouring  not  to  cry  herself,  and  to  make  the 
gentle  straggler  who  had  rescued  Claude  do  so, 
by  the  way  in  which  she  praised  Claude's  past, 
and  prognosticated  all  sorts  of  joys  for  his  young 
wife  and  himself,  did  he  but  survive  "this." 
Despite  the  way  in  which  she  had  looked  into 
the  water  that  night  at  Richmond— -despite  the 
way  in  which  she  had  thrown  over  the  result 
of  that  sagacious  look  when  a  brighter  star  pro- 
mised to  shine  upon  her — despite  divers  dubious 
deeds,  that  some  women,  who  had  done  ditto  in 
the  dark,  were  very  hard  upon,  she  had  a  heart, 
and  it  was  larger  and  more  loving  than  Grace 
Harper,  whose  conduct  had  always  been  imma- 
culate, possessed.  The  woman  who  had  erred  and 
been  sorry  for  her  sin,  and  succeeded  brilliantly, 
as  success  goes  socially,  after  it  all,  saw  how 
keenly  jealous  the  hot-hearted  young  wife  of 
the  man  who  had  loved  her  (Adele)  once,  was 
of  her.  She  forgave  the  jealousy  freely,  knowing 
that  perhaps,  if  Bella  knew  all,  still  stronger 
pangs  would  have  assailed  her.  She  forgave  it 
freely,  not  in  an  obtrusively  magnanimous  way 
that  is  far  harder  to  endure  than  outright  open 
antagonism,  but  with  a  quiet,  hearty  thorough- 
ness that,  could  it  only  have  been  made  patent 
to  Bella,  would  have  won  that  misguided  indi- 
vidual's suffrages  at  once. 

The  fine,  fair,  generous-looking  creature  in  the 
carriage — the  bonnie  blonde  whom  Bell  trusted 
— would  have  been  a  far  more  dangerous  rival, 
even  in  a  legitimate  field,  when  once  her  pale 
envy,  her  rancorous  spite,  was  roused.  There 
was  something  broad  and  smooth  and  quiet 
about  her,  something  fair  and  fleshy,  somnolent 
and  soft,  that  was  very  disarming.  She  was 
just  the  woman  to  whom  a  tired  man  would 
turn — on  whom  a  deceived  man  would  rely. 
You  could  not  look  upon  her  placid,  fair  face, 
and  fear  that  she  would  ever  plot  and  intrigue 
ever  so  innocently.  "  There  was  such  a  lot  of 
the  animal  and  so  little  of  that  beastly  danger- 
ous intellect  about  her,"  as  an  artist  once  said, 
that  she  lapped  all  suspicion  of  everything  not 
being  all  fair  and  above-board,  to  slumber.  She 
would  develop  into  a  glorious  specimen  of  Eng- 
lish motherliness  and  matronhood,  men's  eyes 
and  tastes  told  them.  But  somehow  their  in- 
stincts whispered  a  different  tale,  and  very  few 
of  them  had  given  her  the  option  of  so  develop- 
ing yet. 

There  was  this  peculiarity  about  Grace- 
about  the  woman  who  looked  so  unimpassioned 
— who  seemed,  to  casual  guileless  observers  of 
her  own  sex,  so  uncommonly  hard  to  move, — 
there  was  this  peculiarity  about  her — she  liked 
this  man  less  now  that  he  was  insensible,  help- 
less, incapable  of  looking  hot  things  hotly, 
whether  he  meant  them  or  not,  at  her.  She 
liked  him  less ;  she  was  far  less  moved  towards 
him  than  she  had  been  inwardly  in  his  hours  of 
strength,  albeit  in  those  hours  he  had  over- 
looked her.  She  was  devoid  of  that  generous 
womanly  instinct  which  is  usually  attributed  to 
women.  Look  in  her  face,  and  you  would  at 
once  imagine  a  sister  of  mercy  in  the  widest 
sense  of  the  phrase.  Look  in  her  heart,  and 
you  would  perceive,  equally  at  once,  that  the 
man's  powerlessness  wiped  off  all  his  claim 
upon  her.  She  had  no  feeling,  no  pity,  no 
tenderness  for  incapacity.  She  revolted  in- 
wardly from  all  that  was  weaker  than  herself. 


She  had  none  of  a  woman's  pride  in  being,  even 
for  the  briefest  space,  a  protecting  power.  She 
was  not  adapted  for  the  part  of  a  ministering 
angel. 

Still  she,  being  a  well-trained,  well-brought- 
up,  discreetly  -  nurtured,  nineteenth  -  century 
young  English  lady,  said  and  did  all  that  was 
becoming,  and  left  unsaid  and  undone  all  that 
might  have  been  construed  into  unbecoming,  on 
this  occasion.  She  was  a  large,  soft,  apparent- 
ly trustworthy '"  something  to  lean  upon."  Ac- 
cordingly misguided  Bella  leant  upon  her 
morally  and  physically  during  the  sad  hours 
that  ensued  while  Claude's  case  was  still  one  of 
doubt. 

Leant  upon  her,  and  confided  in  her  in  a 
measure,  and  utterly  scorned  Lady  Lexley,  and 
turned  away  resolutely  from  all  poor  Circe's 
efforts  at  consolation.  Lady  Lexley  sat  and 
shed  genuine  tears  of  genuine  sorrow  for  this 
thing  that  had  come  upon  the  young  man 
around  whom  she  had  thrown  her  spell  once. 
She  was  heartily  in  earnest,  and  she  did  not 
care  a  bit  for  the  tell-tale  marks  those  tears  left 
upon  her  prepared  cheeks.  What  though  the 
rouge  were  obvious,  and  the  yellowish  powder 
removed  with  irregularity?  She  had  tears  in 
her  heart,  and  she  would  shed  them  out,  little 
thinking  that  the  truth  those  tears  made  mani- 
fest rendered  her  more  odious  still  in  the  eyes 
of  the  wife  of  the  man  for  whom  she  wept. 

They  carried  Claude  up-stairs,  and  laid  him  on 
the  big  hearse-like  bed — the  bed  of  state,  and 
dust,  and  black  velvet,  and  plumes,  and  all  the 
other  abominations  that  go  to  the  making  up  of 
the  couch  of  importance  in  the  home  of  anti- 
quity— and  stripped  him  of  the  gay  and  dainty 
clothing  that  he  had  carried  so  spotlessly  to 
the  cover-side  that  morning.  Then  the  doctor, 
whom  they  had  summoned  with  a  speed  that 
still  seemed  slow  to  Bella,  came ;  and  then — 
then  her  heart,  and  her  horror,  and  her  huge 
love  for  her  husband,  and  remorse  that  she  had 
permitted  anger  to  obtain  in  her  soul  for  a  mo- 
ment, overcame  her,  and  she  went  and  crouched 
away  and  drank  water  in  a  corner  in  order  to 
save  herself  from  fainting,  and  so  distracting  an 
atom  of  attention  from  Claude — from  the  one 
whose  state  called  for  all  that  could  be  given. 

Went  and  crouched  away  in  a  corner,  gasp- 
ing for  breath  and  gulping  down  water,  with  a 
terrible  undefined  feeling  that  all  misery  was 
immediately  about  to  crush  down  upon  and 
destroy  her.  It  was  not  her  nerves  or  her  heart 
that  failed  her  at  this  crisis.  It  was  simply 
that  she,  not  having  the  muscles  of  a  bison,  be- 
came physically  incapable  of  standing  by,  now, 
alas !  when  Claude  most  needed  her.  But  they 
— those  others  that  loved  him  well  also — saw 
all  that  she  did  in  a  distorted  mirror.  So  they 
cast  oblique  glances  upon  her  in  her  uncon- 
sciousness and  corner,  and  were  obtrusively 
strong-minded  and  "  incapable  of  considering 
their  own  feelings  at  such  a  moment,"  on  the 
spot. 

I  wrong  his  mother,  though,  in  including  her 
in  this  somewhat  sweeping  assertion.  No ; 
there  was  nothing  obtrusive  in  the  way  in 
which  she  came  up,  without  words,  and  just 
looked  her  resolve  to  stand,  close  to  her  sense- 
less son,  and  hear  the  verdict  as  soon  as  it 
might  be  given,  and  know  the  worst  as  soon  as  it 


might  be  told.  Be  it  told,  too,  that  though  there 
was  all  this  in  her  look,  there  was  not  a  trace 
of  aught  that  might  be  construed  into  censure 
of  her  son's  wife  in  it.  All  her  silent  eloquence 
was  expended  in  asking  and  hoping  that  all 
might  be  well  with  the  hope  of  her  house,  and 
wildly  fearing  that  it  would  not  be  so. 

But  Mrs.  Markham  made  up  amply  for  her 
mother's  generous  abnegation  of  the  bliss  of 
blaming.  She  was  considerably  "  upset " — that 
was  how  she  phrased  it  herself — for  her  love  for 
her  brother  was  an  honest  love,  albeit  some- 
what of  an  exacting  one.  But  she  was  a  wo- 
man who  was  never  distraught  to  the  point  of 
becoming  oblivious  of  the  shortcomings  of  those 
around  whom  she  did  not  like.  It  is  perhaps 
well  for  the  better  ordering  of  the  social  state 
that  this  type  of  woman  should  be  lavished 
upon  a  miserable  and  erring  section  of  humanity. 
I  can  only  say,  thank  God,  that  such  an  one 
does  not  dwell  in  the  tents  with  me 1 

She  was  an  admirable  executive  power, 
though — especially  at  such  a  time  as  this,  when 
to  be  prompt  was  the  first  condition.  No  other 
woman  would  have  had  up  boiling  water  and 
an  unlimited  supply  of  the  softest  blankets,  to 
say  nothing  of  the  stomach-pump,  and  a  bottle 
of  the  best  brandy,  into  Claude's  room,  in  such 
a  short  space  of  time.  Servants  never  stayed 
to  ask  her  irrelevant  questions,  and  she  had  the 
art  of  causing  them  to  comprehend,  in  the  few- 
est words  that  a  woman  can  bring  herself  to 
utter  on  an  emergency.  They  did  not  like  Mrs. 
Markham,  those  obedient  domestics,  but  they 
did  what  she  told  them,  which  was  far  more  to 
the  purpose.  On  the  whole,  then,  it  will  be 
perceived  that  she  had  her  good  side.  Her  good 
side,  indeed!  the  most  tedious  thing  to  be  en- 
dured about  her  was,  that  even  her  most  aggra- 
vating side  was  not  "  bad  " — was  not  a  thing 
to  be  justly  hated,  though  heartily  hated  it 
was. 

On  this  occasion  executive  power,  and  fore- 
thought, and  a  knowledge  of  what  "  would  be 
wanted  next,"  was  much  needed,  and  was,  in 
truth,  invaluable.  "  I  shall  retire  into  a  corner 

and  cry  when  my  brother  is  better,  or " 

She  did  not  finish  her  sentence,  but  she  jerked 
its  meaning  emphatically  towards  poor  Bella, 
who  did  not  hear  her,  or  anything  else,  in  fact, 
save  the  maddening  throbs  of  her  heart  and 
the  jingle  of  her  teeth  against  the  glass,  with 
which  she  could  not  avoid  coming  in  contact 
through  agitation.  Mrs.  Markham  made  her 
speech  to  Lady  Lexley  and  Miss  Harper,  both 
of  whom  were  standing  about  aimlessly  in  the 
dressing-room,  and  Miss  Grace  whispered  to 
her  companion  that  Mrs.  Markham  was  always 
"so  collected  and  so  good;"  whereat  Lady 
Lexley  looked  at  Mrs.  Markham,  and  thought 
that  it  was  almost  a  pity  that  her  well-ordered 
wits  did  not  impel  her  to  say  a  kind  word,  or 
give  a  gentle  touch,  which  would  not  have 
occupied  a  moment's  more  time,  to  the  player 
of  the  voluntary  on  the  glass  in  the  corner. 
Of  course  Mrs.  Markham  was  doing  her  duty 
most  perfectly;  her  conduct  was  flawless,  and 
her  heart  was  sincerely  in  her  work.  But  she 
was  not  moulded  out  of  soft  stuff.  She  could 
not  deal  gently  with  the  erring,  and  she  thought 
her  "brother's  wife  was  erring  now.  The  very 
atmosphere,  which  always  seemed  so  hazy 


about  her  presence,  expressed  this  thought — 
that  was  all. 

Never  having  been  half-drowned,  I  feel  that 
failure  ignominious  and  total  will  be  my  portion 
if  I  attempt  to  describe  the  sensations  which 
swept  through  Claude  "Walsingham  during 
those  few  first  poignant  moments  when  the 
partial  restoration  is  hovering  between  the 
black  "all  being  over"  and  the  dim  grey  of 
possible  recovery.  But  from  the  period  of  the 
dawning  of  that  dim  grey  I  will  venture  to 
take  up  the  theme. 

His  heart  had  given  signs,  so  had  his  pulse. 
These  signals  were  responded  to  speedily  by 
his  blood,  which  proceeded  to  diffuse  itself,  and 
gradually  dispel  that  awful  livid  look  which 
had  reigned  all  too  long  in  his  face.  He 
breathed — he  opened  his  eyes — he  was  living. 
"  He  will  live,"  his  mother  said,  turning  round 
and  sending  her  voice  straight,  soft,  and  low,  to 
the  corner  in  which  Bella  was  crouching.  The 
sound  fell  upon  her  ears — her  heart:  it  drew 
her  up,  and. threw  the  glass  down,  and  brought 
her  to  the  side  of  the  bed  just  as  he  turned  his 
head  and  murmured,  "  My  poor  girl !  have 

they  got  the  grey  home,   and "     But  he 

could  say  no  more  just  then,  on  account  of  a  cer- 
tain looseness  of  tongue,  and  difficulty  of  defi- 
nitely deciding  on  an  idea  to  which  he  desired 
to  give  words.  But  for  all  this  looseness  and 
difficulty  they  knew  that  he  was  safe :  he — the 
pride  and  hope  of  the  house — the  true  English 
gentleman — whose  first  thought  after  a  mighty 
danger  was  for  his  wife,  hiFsecond  for  his  horse. 

There  being  nothing  more  to  be  done,  the 
doctor  promised  to  "  look  in  "  at  brief  intervals, 
and  soon  the  incidentals  removed  themselves 
from  the  vicinity  of  his  room,  leaving  Bella  and 
Mrs.  Walsingham  in  possession,  subject  only  to 
occasional  raids  from  Mrs.  Markham.  Lady 
Lexley  and  Miss  Harper  had  agreed  to  remain 
till  late  in  the  day,  in  order  to  see  "  how  he 
went  on,"  and  to  take  away  the  latest  intelli- 
gence for  their  own  dinner-table.  They  were 
very  cosy  and  comfortable  down  in  the  drawing- 
room  with  Mrs.  Markham,  on  three  couches 
drawn  up  close  to  the  fire.  Miss  Harper  was 
specially  so,  for  she  let  off  a  lot  of  judicious 
laments  about  Mrs.  Claude ;  laments  as  to  her 
frivolity,  and  allusions  to  her  notorious  love  of 
flirtation,  and  she  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing 
that  few,  if  any,  of  her  shots  missed  fire  on  the 
sister  of  the  man  about  whose  wife  she  was 
saying  insidious  words,  that  might  neither  be 
verified  nor  refuted. 

"  I  am  sure  there  is  not  a  bit  of  harm  in  her 
— but — well,  Lord  Lexley  isn't  one  to  say  a 
word  about  a  woman,  is  he  now,  Ellen?  and 
even  he  looked  rather  queer,  and  said  some- 
thing, I  can't  remember  what;  but  that  I 
was  very  sorry  to  hear  about  your  brother's 
wife." 

"  I  am  certain  Lexley  never  said  nor  looked 
a  word  against  her,"  Lady  Lexley  exclaimed. 
"More  than  that,  I'm  very  certain  he  has 
nothing  to  say.  I  should  think  I  ought  to 
know  as  much  about  my  own  husband  as  you 
do,  Grace." 

"Oh!  of  course  it's  nothing,"  Miss  Harper 
responded,  hurriedly ;  "  at  least,  I  think  nothing 
of  such  things ;  but  then,  some  people  do,  you 
know." 


ON  GUARD. 


93 


"  "Well,  what  is  said  ?  You're  making  a  nice 
impression  on  Mrs".  Markham.  What  '  is  said ' 
is  better  than  what  you  imply." 

"  Only  that  she  has  flirted.  I  tell  you  that 
1  think  nothing  of  it." 

"  Then  why  do  you  talk  about  it  ?  Let  us 
talk  of  something  else.  How  jolly  this  tea  is. 
That  poor  girl  upstairs  would  like  a  cup,  I 
have  no  doubt.  Stay  !  don't  send ;  I'll  take  it 
to  her." 

So  Lady  Lesley  ran  upstairs  with  a  cup  of 
tea  for  Bella,  and  while  she  was  away  Miss 
Harper  generously  remarked  that — 

"Professionals  naturally  get  looser  notions, 
don't  they  ?  Not  that  I  would  breathe  a  word 
against  Adele,  as  far  as  she  goes  herself;  but 
she  has  lived  in  a  world  where  there  is  a  good 
deal  of  freedom,  among  people  who  think  no- 
thing of  a  kiss  on  a  lady's  hand,  more  or  less ; 
but  then  we  do." 

*Miss  Harper  said  'f  we  do  "  all  in  capital  let- 
ters, in  a  way  that  drew  the  line  at  once  be- 
tween that  world  of  which  she  spoke  and  the 
guileless  one  in  which  Mrs.  Markham.  and  her- 
self had  been  nurtured.  Her  tone,  her  voice, 
her  words,  all  had  the  true  "  county  persons  " 
ring  about  them,  just  rendered  a  trifle  less  har- 
monious than  they  would  otherwise  have  been, 
by  a  dash  of  spite. 

She  hated  Mrs.  Claude  "Walsingham.  Hated 
her  not  alone  for  being  prettier  and  wittier 
than  herself,  and  for  that  winning  for  which 
she  (Grace)  had  waited — the  winning  of  Claude, 
namely ;  but  also  for  that  nameless  something 
which  may  not  be  defined,  which  we  call 
"charm"  and  " fascination  "  for  want  of  bet- 
ter words,  and  then,  to  ourselves  even,  utterly 
fail  to  express  our  own  meaning.  Miss  Harper 
would  have  given  much — say  the  peace  of  mind 
for  a  month  of  her  nearest  relative — in  order 
that  she  might  have  seen  Bella  even  tempora- 
rily abashed,  discomfited,  or  lightly  esteemed 
by  one  in  whose  estimation  Bella  might  be  sup- 
posed to  desire  to  stand  well.  Apparently 
there  was  a  lack  of  all  motive  in  this  desire  to 
under-rate ;  but  in  reality  the  motive  was  pow- 
erful enough.  Another  had  been  preferred 
before  her  I 

There  was  nothing  chivalrous  in  this  girl's 
nature.  She  would  strike  from  behind,  and 
feel  no  shame  in  so  doing,  provided  no  one  were 
by  to  see  the  blow  dealt.  She  had  never  in  the 
course  of  her  life  been  guilty  of  a  single  action 
that  could  have  been  stigmatised  as  "  unlady- 
like "  by  the  most  severe  of  critics.  But  had 
she  been  a  man,  one  could  not  have  applied  the 
title  of  "  gentleman,"  in  its  proudest,  fullest 
meaning,  to  her. 

Now  that  she  was  left  alone  with  Claude's 
rigorous  sister,  she  sat  and  said  a  lot  of  little 
things  that  are  extremely  difficult  to  set  down 
in  black  and  white,  and  that  nevertheless  leave 
a  bad  impression  on  the  mind  for  whose  benefit 
they  are  uttered.  Taken  by  themselves,  look- 
ed at  separately,  each  sentence  that  she  spoke 
was  harmless  and  of  little  consequence.  But 
the  dangerous  thing  about  these  sentences  of 
hers  was,  that  one  could  not  gaze  at  them 
separately  with  the  calm  eyes  of  cool  reason. 
One  could  but  gather  them  together,  so  subtly 
were  they  linked,  and  find  them  uncommonly 
unpleasant  in  such  union.  One  could  but 


mark,  the  while  these  words  were  being  said, 
how  soft  was  the  face  of  the  speaker,  and  tell 
oneself  that  from  so  genial  a  soil  nought  pre- 
meditatedly  evil  had  ever  sprung.  It  was  such 
a  tenderly  tinted  face !  It  was  so  innocently 
plump  1  It  had  such  gentle  lips  and  cloudless 
eyes !  Not  of  such  materials  are  formed  the 
lagos,  male  or  female,  surely  ? 

"I  like  her  so  much  that  I  am  sure  you 
.won't  wrong  me  by  thinking  I  have  said  a 
word  of  this  in  unkindness,"  Miss  Harper  said, 
in  reference  to  Bella,  when  they  heard  Lady 
Lexley's  footfall  outside  the  door. 

"My  dear,  I  know  you  too  well!"  Mrs. 
Markham  replied,  earnestly.  "  In  unkindness, 
indeed !" 

"  And  you  must  promise  me  that  you  won't 
think  about  it  at  all?  I  have  been  carried 
away  into  telling  you  little  things  I  have  heard, 
which,  very  probably,  have  but  small  founda- 
tion in  fact."  This  Miss  Harper  said  in  a  very 
low  voice — almost  in  a  whisper — as  Lady  Lex- 
ley  strove  to  occupy  herself  with  something 
else  at  the  extreme  end  of  the  room,  in  the 
way  people  do  strive  to  occupy  themselves 
when  the  discovery  dawns  upon  them  that  their 
advent  is  inopportune. 

"Oh,  of  course  not!  of  course  not!"  Mrs. 
Markham  replied,  glibly.  But  she  did  think 
about  it  for  all  that  glibly  given  promise ;  and 
she  resolved  that  for  his  good,  when  he  came 
out  of  his  present  danger,  her  brother  should 
think  about  it  too. 

Jack  came  home  about  half-past  five,  in  a 
terribly  cast  down  condition.  He  had  been 
very  high-hearted  all  day,  for  the  brown  hunter 
had  faced  all  things  that  came  in  his  way 
bravely,  and  had  been  in  a  very  good  place 
when  they  found.  "Wearily  jogging  home- 
wards, however,  he  had  been  met  with  tidings 
of  Claude's  accident,  and  Mrs.  Claude's  distress  ; 
and  his  heart  was  very  sore  for  these  things, 
though  Claude  had  snubbed  him  ruthlessly  this 
morning,  and  Mrs.  Claude  turned  upon  him 
glances  of  constraint.  He  had  no  idea,  poor 
boy !  that  he  had  been  the  cause  of  Bella  being 
made  to  feel  that  the  bit  was  in  her  mouth  with 
some  severity. 

He  went  up  in  his  hunting  garb  to  his  bro- 
ther's dressing-room,  and  poured  out  poignant  in- 
quiries through  the  key-hole  as  to  how  Claude 
was  progressing.  Inquiries  that  caused  Bella's 
hair  to  stand  aloof  from  her  head,  in  that  they 
were  uttered  in  accents  unmanageable  through 
emotion;  commencing  in  a  husky  bass  and 
terminating  in  a  shrill  treble,  that  sounded  like 
a  whistle  in  the  ears  of  the  dozing  invalid. 

"You  go  to  bed,  and  I'll  sit  up  with  him," he 
suggested,  earnestly,  but  inconsequently,  there 
being  no  question  as  yet.  in  the  broad  daylight, 
of  any  one  sitting  up  with  Claude. 

"No,  no!  hush-h!  do!"  Bella  implored,  in  a 
series  of  gasps  that  came  from  her  gratitude  to 
Jack  for  this  devotion  to  her  bosom's  lord,  and 
her  great  dread  that  the  expression  of  such  de- 
votion might  awaken  said  bosom's  lord. 

"  Then  I'll  sit  here,  and  you  shall  call  me  if 
you  want  me ;  will  you  ?" 

Bella  went  to  the  door,  opened  it  a  tiny  bit, 
and  extended  her  hand  to  him  through  the 
crevice. 

"Yes,  I  will,"  she  said,  looking  up  with  a 


94 


OX  GUARD 


loving  thankfulness,  that  grew  out  of  her  great 
love  for  his  brother,  into  his  agitated,  frank, 
loving  young  face.  "Yes,  I  will,  Jack." 

She  was  so  pale,  so  worn,  so  miserably  anx- 
ious. These  hours  of  watching — they  had  not 
been  many — had  toned  down  so  much  of  that 
brightness  that  had  been  so  beautiful  in  his 
eyes.  Much  of  her  vitality  had  vanished,  and 
there  was  a  sorrowful  soberness  about  her  that 
touched  him  inexpressibly.  He  loved  his  bro- 
ther well,  too.  Altogether,  the  great  wish  that 
he  could  have  taken  Claude's  place  and  spared 
her  pain  made  itself  manifest  in  his  face,  as  he 
stooped  it  over  the  little  hand  he  had  clasped 
through  the  crevice,  and  kissed  it. 

"  Jack,  you  had  better  go  and  dress  for  din- 
ner ;  you're  merely  detaining  Mrs.  Claude,"  a 
cold  voice  said  behind  him;  and  he  looked 
round,  and  Bella  looked  up  through  the  tears 
his  brotherly  sympathy  had  brought  into  her 
eyes,  to  see"  Mrs.  Markham  and  Grace  Harper 
standing  in  the  doorway  of  the  dressing-room. 

"Grace  has  come  to  hear  the  latest  bulletin. 
From  your  not  being  with  him,  Bella,  I  con- 
clude my  brother  is  better,"  Mrs.  Markham 
said,  reproachfully,  as  Jack  got  himself  away 
out  of  their  presence,  with  a  gait  to  which  he 
could  not  impart  an  atom  of  dignity,  or  render 
aught  but  slinking,  for  the  life  of  him.  He  had 
kissed  Bella's  hand  as  reverentially  as  he  would 
have  kissed  the  hand  of  the  queen.  But  he  had 
his  instincts,  and  they  led  him  to  feel  how 
much  better  it  would  have  been  had  that  special 
evidence  of  his  reverence  for  her  not  been  visi- 
ble to  the  eyes  of  such  beholders.  So  he 
dressed  in  discomfort,  and  ate  his  dinner  with  a 
heart  that  was  heavy  for  his  brother — and  for 
something  else. 

Bella  was  troubled  with  no  foreboding  un- 
connected with  Claude's  physical  state.  Very 
frankly  did  she  make  a  statement  of  all  the 
symptoms  that  had  intervened  since  Miss  Har- 
per had  been  there  last,  up  to  the  present  time, 
to  that  young  lady.  She  almost  felt  sorry  that 
the  fair,  remarkably  womanly-looking  girl  was 
going  away  from  the  Court.  The  matrons  who 
remained  were  so  much  harder  than  the  maiden 
who  was  leaving  it  appeared  to  her.  In  per- 
fect trust  and  confidence  she  would,  had  oppor- 
tunity offered,  have  laid  her  head  down  upon 
the  buxom  white  shoulder,  and  breathed  out  a 
portion  of  her  anguish  and  anxiety  respecting 
Claude,  and  her  remorse  touching  that  letter 
she  had  written,  and  her  defiant  determination 
to  ride  Devilskin.  The  opportunity  not  offer- 
ing, however,  she  did  not  do  it,  which  was, 
perhaps,  just  as  well. 

Late  in  the  night,  or,  rather,  early  in  the 
morning,  Claude  roused  himself  a  little,  and  the 
untiring  watcher  by  his  side  leant  over  and 
heard  him  speak  coherently  once  more. 

"You  poor,  little,  weary  mouse!  this  is  a 
great  deal  too  much  for  you,"  he  whispered 
faintly,  putting  his  hand  on  her  head  with  a 
touch  that  told  better  even  than  his  loving 
words  how  dear  her  presence  was  to  him. 

"I'm  not  weary  a  bit,"  she  said,  softly;  and 
then  some  tears  rolled  down  on  his  face  before 
she  was  aware  that  they  were  springing  from 
her  eyes,  as  she  went  on  to  tell  him  how  tender 
Jack  had  been  about  him,  and  how  anxious  to 
help  her  in  her  vigil.  Claude  lay  listening 


thoughtfully  to  this  communication  for  a  minute ; 
then  he  smoothed  her  hair  again,  calling  her 
"darling "and  "pet,"  and  bidding  her  forget 
that  crossness  of  his  as  to  Jack  and  other  things 
which  had  been  so  grievous  to  her.  He  de- 
clared that  he  had  been  "simply  brutal,"  and 
this  was  more  grievous  still  to  hear  in  his  pre- 
sent state.  "But  you'll  never  distrust  me 
again,  Claude?" 

"Never;  not  even  if  you  compare  me  with 
dear  old  Stanley,  who  was  an  infinitely  better 
fellow  than  I  shall  ever  be,"  he  replied.  And 
at  that  reply  Bella  blushed  hotly  in  spite  of  her- 
self, for  had  she  not  already  compared  them  ? 


CHAPTER  XXIX. 

"ONE  MORE  UNFORTUNATE." 

THIS  life  to  which  Stanley  returned  was  not  one 
with  which  he  was  acquainted.  The  scene  upon 
which  his  eyes  opened  had  never  been  gazed 
upon  by  him  before.  It  was  all  strange  and 
disturbing— disturbing  by  reason  of  its  extreme 
peacefulness. 

It  was  useless  to  try  and  remember  where  he 
had  been  and  what  he  had  been  prior  to  this 
existence.  There  was  warm  sunshine  around 
him  now ;  there  were  tuay  rosebuds — or  were 
they  fairies'  faces?  blinking  at  him  from  the 
curtains  and  the  wall. 

The  peacefulness  of  it,  and  the  prettiness  of  it, 
the  beauty  of  the  rest  he  was  enjoying — was  it 
all  a  dream  ?  Was  it  entirely  the  creation  of 
that  burning  spirit  of  inspiration  he  had  begged 
as  a  boon  of  his  landlady  but  an  hour  ago,  as  it 
seemed  ? 

He  closed  his  eyes  as  his  reflections  reached 
this  point ;  the  lashes  trembled  down  and  light- 
ed upon  his  cheeks,  and  as  they  touched  he 
went  off  into  blest  oblivion  again,  and  a  watcher 
by  his  side  stifled  a  sigh  for  that  the  flicker  for 
which  she  had  wearied  so  long  had  been  so  brief. 

The  lamp  of  life  in  this  stranger — this  waif 
and  stray,  cast  up  by  the  tide  of  human  events 
to  her  very  door — had  been  so  faint,  so  feeble, 
for  many  days,  that  the  torch  of  hope  had  been 
sympathetic.  But  now,  for  a  few  minutes,  the 
light  of  life  in  his  had  kindled  that  of  hope  in 
her  eyes  and  heart,  and  now  it  had  gone  out 
again. 

We  saw  Stanley  Yillars  last,  prostrate,  fallen 
down  upon  the  raised  foothpath,  with  the  tawny 
setter  howling  over  him.  The  battle  for  life 
had  been  a  little  too  strong  for  him ;  he  had 
been  overtaken  and  routed;  he  had  broken 
down  while  making  a  late  feeble  effort  to  regain 
that  best  of  all  allies  on  any  field — health. 

His  case  was  widely  different  now ;  widely 
different  and  far  better.  The  scene  on  which 
his  eyes  had  closed  was  all  the  more  unpleasant 
by  contrast  with  that  one  on  which  they  opened. 

For  they  opened  again  in  about  an  hour  after 
the  flickering  up  and  fading  away  which  was 
alluded  to  at  the  commencement  of  this  chapter. 
The  watch  had  been  weary,  sad,  disheartening; 
but  the  watcher  was  well  rewarded  at  last. 

The  peacefulness  of  that  scene,  and  the  pretti-  \ 
ness  of  it !  These  were  the  influences  which  ( 
had  been  most  apparent  to  him  when  the  light 


GUARD. 


95 


of  reason  first  came  back  to  his  eyes  and 
to  his  soul.  These  were  the  influences  that 
soothed  him  more  and  more,  as  such  light  grew 
stronger. 

The  rosebuds  that  had  looked  to  him  like  the 
faces  of  kind  fairies  when  he  gazed  upon  them 
first,  were  on  the  walls,  and  on  the  curtains  of 
the  bed.  The  windows  were  shrouded  with 
white  muslin,  and  there  was  delicate  feminine 
craft  in  the  broad  blue  ribbon  bows  which 
held  those  curtains  back. 

It  was  a  pretty  room,  fresh,  sweet,  and  simple. 
From  his  bed  in  the  corner  he  commanded  a 
good  view  of  the  toilet  table  in  diaphanous 
drapery,  with  a  tall  vase  of  early  roses  upon  it, 
standing  by  the  side  of  a  large  glass,  hi  which 
was  reflected  a  face. 

The  peacefulness  of  the  room  and  the  pretti- 
ness  of  it,  these  had  been  sufficient  to  arouse 
and  enchain  his  attention  before.  But  now, 
when  he  saw  that  vision  in  the  glass,  he  looked 
no  more  about  him. 

It  was  only  the  head  and  a  portion  of  one  of 
the  shoulders  that  he  saw.  From  the  position, 
he  judged  her  to  be  reading,  though  he  saw  no 
book,  and  heard  no  flutter  or  rustle  from  the 
leaves. 

There  was  a  red  glory — not  a  golden  one,  but 
a  dark  red  glory — in  the  hair  that  crowned  that 
head.  It  was  massed  back  from  her  brow,  and 
arranged  behind  in  two  big  loose  knots,  that 
were  kept  in  place  by  a  net ;  and  from  the  depth 
of  its  colour,  and  the  massiveness  of  its  arrange- 
ments, it  had  the  effect  of  being  too  rich  and 
too  heavy  for  the  head  on  which  it  grew. 

He  got  a  three-quarter  view  of  her  face  in 
the  glass,  and  it  was  such  a  tiny  face,  and  it 
had  such  a  confiding  brow,  and  such  a  rosy, 
dewy  mouth,  and  such  a  very,  very  young,  in- 
nocent, almost  babyish  look  altogether,  that  he 
began  to  pity  it,  he  knew  not  why. 

Do  you  know  that  nose  that  stands  out  well 
from  the  face,  and  is  still  straight  ? — well,  she 
had  it.  Do  you  know  that  mouth  that  springs 
like  a  rosebud  with  the  morning  mist  upon  it 
from  immediately  beneath  this  nose  ? — she  had 
that  too.  That  style  of  face  to  which  this  nose 
and  mouth  belong  is  far  more  perfect  in  expres- 
sion than  in  feature.  Yet  the  expression  is  no 
more  intellectual  than  the  features  are  perfect. 
The  face  is  mobile,  sympathetic— a  thing  to  love 
and  be  sorry  for — to  kiss  and  to  leave ! — so  God 
help  the  possessors  of  such ! 

It  was  sweetly  pretty  this  face  that  he  saw 
in  the  glass.  Sweetly  pretty  by  right  of  its 
babyishness,  of  its  plaintive  sweetness.  It 
stirred  him  by  its  drooping  beauty ;  it  made  him 
wish  to  hear  it  speak,  made  him  desire  to  touch 
it,  and  see  whether  or  not  it  would  alter  under 
that  touch — whether  it  had  feeling — whether  it 
could  sadden  into  harshness,  brighten  into 
broad  laughs,  as  other  faces  do — or  whether  it 
was  always  plaintively  sweet,  droopingly  beau- 
tiful, and  nothing  more. 

He  tried,  lying  there,  prone  and  helpless — for 
his  had  been  a  fever,  and  he  could  not  move — 
to  recall  what  he  had  known  last,  before  this 
blest  oblivion  had  been  his.  He  forgot  the 
walk  he  had  taken,  he  forgot  the  prostration  of 
spirit  he  had  known  during  it,  he  forgot  the  dog 
who  had  stood  by  him  to  the  last — he  only  re- 
membered that  he  still  had  work  to  do ! 


That  uncompleted  novel,  that  unfinished  plot, 
those  waiting  devils !  He  lifted  his  head  from 
the  pillow  as  he  thought  of  them,  and  his  head 
was  very  weak.  It  fell  back  again,  and  the 
soothing  influence  of  peace  and  prettiness  that 
were  around  him  kept  it  there. 

There  was  a  charm— he  knew  it  was  a  charm, 
because  he  had  heard,  or  had  he  read  ?  of  such 
things— in  the  atmosphere.  But  suddenly  it 
occurred  to  him  that  he  might  as  well  break  it, 
as  it  could  not  last  for  ever — break  it,  and  get 
back  to  that— whatever  it  might  be  that  was 
waiting  for  him.  So  he  moved  and  spoke. 
Moved  with  a  jerk,  and  spoke  out  in  a  spasm 
—spoke  words  that  had  voice,  and  desperate 
uncertainty,  and  desolation  in  them— nothing 
else. 

Poor  fellow !  I  declare,  that  for  this  semblance 
of  the  truth  whom  I  have  conjured  up,  I  have 
such  a  deep  pity,  such  a  sad  sympathy !  That 
horrible  dread  of  wasting  the  time  that  was  his 
rock,  his  anchor,  his  all,  was  upon  him.  He 
dared  not  be  at  peace,  even  for  his  own  good. 

So  he  broke  the  spell  by  means  of  which  he 
enjoyed  this  charmed  rest,  and  spoke.  His 
words  rang  in  their  irrelevance  deep  into  the 
quiet  of  the  room,  and  the  peace  fled,  and  that 
reflection  in  the  glass  broke  from  its  stillness, 
threw  aside  its  drooping  beauty,  and  was,  in  the 
one  instant  he  saw  it  after  its  alteration,  the 
young  woman  of  this  world  once  more. 

He  would  not  be  at  peace,  even  for  his  own 
good.  He  would  test  the  tangibility  of  this 
vision  that  was  fleeing.  Even  in  his  present 
state  of  semi-unconsciousness,  he  remembered 
that  illusions  might  be  his  at  any  moment :  this 
was  a  seeming  fact — he  would  dare  to  stay  it. 

It  was  all  very  dreamy ;  the  first  stage  of  a 
recovery  from  a  bad  fever  is  apt  to  be  so.  That 
unfinished  work  of  his,  that  thing  still  to  be 
done  within  a  given  time,  was  running  in  his 
head,  as  he  half  turned  on  the  pillow  and  asked 
vaguely  "  what  it  was." 

The  vision  in  the  glass  had  started  when  he 
had  first  moved  restlessly,  and  now  he  turned 
his  head,  half  hoping  that  it  might  be  she  on 
whom  his  eyes  would  rest  in  the  flesh.  Such 
hopes  were  not  realised ;  and  yet  I  can  scarcely 
say  that  he  was  disappointed,  as  his  looks  light- 
ed on  a  clean  old  woman  with  a  kind  face,  who 
did  not  look  as  if  a  legion  of  small  bills  were 
behind  .her,  which  was  what  his  later  experience 
of  old  women  rather  led  him  to  expect. 

There  was  no  fear  of  losing  oneself  in 
shadowy  depths  in  her  face.  It  was  a  healthy, 
rosy,  round,  kind,  old  face,  commonplace,  and 
addicted  to  smiling  without  due  cause,  but  not 
at  all  to  be  evaded  by  one  on  a  bed  of  pain  or 
weakness.  Immediately  at  sight  of  her,  Stanley 
Yillars  had  pleasant  thoughts  of  nice  thick  ar- 
rowroot and  complete  rest — of  downy  idleness, 
and  egg  and  sherry  at  eleven  ;  thoughts,  happy 
thoughts  of  a  period  of  being  ill  or  convalescent, 
as  the  case  might  be,  comfortably,  with  the  con- 
sciousness of  its  not  behoving  him  to  do  any- 
thing, save  take  his  restoratives  regularly. 

He  lay  there  looking  at  her  in  perfect  peace 
for  a  while,  wondering,  with  a  gentle  wonder, 
whether  she  would  change  into  anything  else 
presently ;  for  he  associated  that  vision  in  the 
glass  with  her,  and  looked  beneath  the  border 
of  her  cap  with  his  weak  eyes,  marvelling 


96 


ON  GUAKD. 


curiously  whither  that  red  glory  had  vanished. 
But  she  remained  an  old  woman  sufficiently 
long  to  reassure  him — an  old  woman  in  a  dark 
dress  and  a  mob  cap,  who  might  have  pursued 
Mr.  Banting's  system  with  advantage  for  a 
period — an  everyday  old  woman,  whose  kindly, 
commonplace,  stupid,  round,  rosy  face  banished 
the  fairy  faces  from  the  bursting  rosebuds  that 
were  blooming  round  the  room. 

"  You  feel  yourself  to  be  yourself,  as  one  may 
say,  again,  sir ;  and  heartily  glad  my  missus  and 
I  are  to  see  it,"  she  said,  when  he  had  stared  at 
her  for  a  short  time. 

He  smiled  as  graciously  as  his  wanness  would 
admit  of  his  doing  in  response,  and  his  smile  was 
echoed,  as  it  were,  by  a  relieved  sigh  from  a 
corner,  which  he  could  not  command  from  his 
position  on  the  pillow. 

"  I'm  not  certain  about  feeling  myself,  for  I'm 
not  clear  who  I  am,"  he  said,  presently,  on 
which  the  everyday  old  woman  laughed,  as  if 
this  uncertainty  of  his  were  a  great  joke,  and 
deftly  prepared  him  a  draught  the  while,  with 
which  she  presently  dosed  him. 

"It  not  being  for  sleeping,  speech  is  not  for- 
bid," she  said,  solemnly,  when  he  had  taken  it ; 
on  which  encouragement  he  combated  his  desire 
to  sleep  again  and  know  nothing,  and  asked  her 
"  where  he  was  ?  and,  if  she  could  tell  him,  how 
he  came  there  ?" 

She  became  terse,  not  to  say  uncommunica- 
tive, at  this  point.  He  was  "where  the  Lord 
Mayor,  to  say  nothing  of  the  Prince  of  Wales, 
might  be,  and  no  shame  to  them,"  she  replied; 
"  more  than  this  she  would  leave  for  her  mistress 
to  tell,  if  so  it  pleased  her." 

"Then  your  mistress  is "  He  looked  to- 
wards the  glass,  and  left  his  question  incom- 
plete. 

"  She  was  sitting  there — bless  her!"  the  old 
woman  answered.  "  She  has  been  sitting  there 
more  days  and  nights  than  I  would  count  to 
you  till  you're  strong  enough  to  add  them  up  of 
yourself,  sir.  But  this  is  not  the  talk  she'd 
have  me  hold  to  you  now,  nor  the  talk  I'd  hold 
of  myself,  if  I  were  not  that  stupid  when  I  think 
of  her."  The  tears  came  into  the  old  woman's 
eyes  at  this  juncture,  and  she  drifted  into  vague 
and  rambling  statements  respecting  her  own 
weakness  on  this  point,  which,  in  Stanley's 
current  state,  were  neither  amusing  nor  in- 
structive. 

He  made  a  great  effort  to  recall  himself. 
"  How  did  I  come  here  ? — tell  me  that  first,"  he 
said;  and  then  there  was  a  faint  whisper  of 
"Rayner,  not  yet— not  yet  I  tell  you!"  from 
that  same  portion  of  the  room  from  which  the 
sigh  had  proceeded  but  just  now.  Altogether, 
between  his  great  effort  to  get  at  the  truth,  and 
that  faintly  whispered  entreaty  to  retain  it,  poor 
Rayner  was  much  bewildered,  and  not  a  trifle 
aggrieved. 

By-and-by,  after  a  short  interval  of  waiting, 
and  wondering  what  it  all  meant,  he  remember- 
ed Rock. 

"  Hadn't  I  a  dog !"  he  asked— "a  big  dog— 
a  setter  ?"  He  was  endeavouring  to  recall 
Rock  to  his  own  mind  by  this  full  description, 
as  much  as  essaying  to  paint  him  to  Rayner. 
He  was  not  sure  whether  he  had  not  dreamt  the 
dog,  and  the  dog  having  been  very  pleasant  to 
him  he  hoped  it  was  no  dream. 


"There  is  a  dog;  but,  bless  his  heart!  ho 
would  be  like  a  mad  thing  if  I  was  to  let  him 
up !"  the  old  woman  replied. 

There  was  a  dog — ah !  and  that  dog  had  been 
given  him  by  Bella  Vane — the  girl  he  was 
going  to  marry — the  woman  who  had  jilted  him 
for  his  old  school-friend,  Claude  Walsingham  1 
He  remembered  everything  now — the  woe,  and 
the  work,  and  the  walk,  and  the  way  those  two 
latter  things  had  grown  out  of  the  former.  He 
remembered  everything  now.  "God!  what  a 
life  to  take  up  again!"  he  thought  bitterly, 
remembering  these  things. 

Presently  a  sound  smote  upon  his  ears — an 
impatient  scraping  afar,  then  a  bounding, 
scratching  footstep — a  rough  scramble  up  on 
to  the  bed,  and  Rock's  great,  loving,  yellow- 
brown  eyes  were  looking  into  his,  and  Rock's 
big,  feathery  tail  was  wagging  its  delight  at  the 
meeting.  It  was  only  a  dog  that  was  so  joyed 
to  welcome  him  back  to  saneness ;  it  was  only 
a  dog  that  seemed  to  smile  upon  the  prospect  of 
returning  strength;  it  was  only  a  dog  that 
seemed  to  say  to  him,  "You  would  have  been 
missed!"  But  the  dog's  sympathy  was  very 
sweet  to  the  lonely  man,  whose  soul  but  a 
minute  before  had  sunk  at  the  thought  of  taking 
up  his  burden  of  life  again. 

He  laid  hold,  with  his  weak,  thin  hands,  of 
the  long,  silky  ears  of  the  setter;  he  looked 
into  the  honest,  loving,  ^llowish-brown  eyes ; 
and  as  he  thought  of  how  she  had  often  patted 
and  caressed  the  dog  thus,  the  anguish  of  his 
life  came  back  with  all  its  force,  and  freshly  as 
at  first  he  mourned  for  the  woman,  and  cursed 
the  perfidy  that  had  wrecked  him !  Better  to 
have  died,  down  on  the  road-side,  like  a  dog, 
than  to  have  come  back  to  life — to  the  know- 
ledge of  the  heart's  disgrace — to  the  remem- 
brance of  how  faithless  had  been  his  friend, 
how  false  his  love,  how  frail  his  faith  in  all 
things — how  utterly  they  had  each  and  all 
failed  him ! 

The  remembrance  aroused  him — stirred  him 
out  of  his  peacefulness,  and  made  him  uneasily 
conscious  that  his  portion  was  not  to  lie  still 
when  stillness  was  essential  to  his  well-being, 
but  that  he  must  be  up  and  doing  whether  he 
were  fit  for  it  or  no.  There  was  some  poor 
task  to  be  done — some  mean  goal  to  be  won — 
and,  living  or  dying,  he  must  do  and  strive  to 
win.  This  was  incumbent  upon  him — he  had 
no  appeal  against  it.  Fate  was  a  pitiless  mon- 
ster to  him,  and  she  decreed  that  he  should 
know  no  rest. 

He  would  obey,  since  he  could  not  resist. 
In  pursuance  of  his  plan  of  obedience,  he  raised 
his  head  from  the  pillow  once  more,  to  Rock's 
great  delight — muttering  some  words  to  him- 
selfj  which  were  intended  as  stimulants,  but 
which,  by  some  curious  process,  though  dictated 
by  his  own  mind,  failed  when  uttered  to  reach 
the  same  again,  but  drifted  off  upon  the  empty 
air,  and  mocked  him,  as  it  were.  Then  his 
head  flattened  upon  his  shoulders,  and  his  eyes 
appeared  to  be  loose  in  his  head,  and  his  whole 
form  went  down  many  yards,  with  a  thump  in 
the  bed,  and  the  flesh  came  off  conqueror  in 
that  never-ceasing  combat  between  itself  and 
the  spirit.  He  was  entirely  broken  down. 

It  was  at  this  moment  that  she  whose  droop- 
ing beauty — whose  babyish,  innocent  beauty— 


ON  GUARD. 


97 


had  seemed  so  sweet  and  touching  a  thing  to 
him,  when  he  looked  upon  it  in  the  glass,  came 
before  him  bodily.  She  crept  up  to  the  side  of 
the  bed,  by  which  the  old  woman  still  stood, 
and  paused  there,  a  mere  girl,  with  a  woman's 
pity  for  him  beaming  from  her  eyes,  and  the 
great  tawny  dog  leaping  up  at  her  as  at  a  tried 
friend. 

She  was  wonderfully  pretty — exquisitely 
pretty  and  innocent-looking— touchingly  simple, 
and  youthful  in  appearance.  No  child's  mouth 
could  be  more  perfectly  pure  in  colour,  outline, 
and  expression  than  hers.  No  angel's  brow 
could  be  more  stainless.  No  woman's  eyes 
more  loving  than  the  sweet,  full,  blue  ones  that 
looked  down  through  a  tender  dew  upon 
him. 

Her  tones  were  very  mortal  though.  Im- 
pressionable as  he  was,  through  his  great  weak- 
ness, he  could  but  be  aware  of  this  fact,  as  the 
childlike  mouth  opened,  and  through  the  parted 
lips  came  the  words — 

"I'm  so  glad  you're  better,  sir!  Is  there 
any  one  I  .can  send  for?  " 

"  No  one,"  he  replied.  He  had  not  spoken 
so  softly  to  any  one  for  months  as  he  now  spoke 
to  her.  Then  he  put  his  hand  out  to  her  over 
Rock's  head,  and  added,  "Have  you  been  my 
little  nurse?" 

"  The  odd  hours,  when  I  was  in,  and  Rayner 
asleep,  I  have  taken,"  she  replied  in  a  matter- 
of-fact  tone. 

"  Then  it  is  to  the  odd  hours  I  must  owe  my 
recovery,"  he  said  softly,  and  a  little  ungrate- 
fully to  Rayner,  it  must  also  be  confessed. 

"  It  was  Rayner  made  you  everything  and 
gave  you  your  draughts,"  the  girl  answered,  in 
her  quaint,  matter-of-fact  way;  "but  I  fed  the 
dog,  and  looked  in  your  pockets  to  try  and  find 
out  who  you  were,"  she  went  on  candidly. 

A  return  of  that  uncertainty  as  to  his  own 
identity  pervaded  his  mind  dimly  for  an  instant, 
as  he  asked — 

"And  did  you  find  out?" 
She  shook  her  head  in  the  negative  and 
blushed,  as  she  remembered  that  in  the  course 
of  the  search  she  had  opened  his  purse,  and 
found  therein  the  sum  of  one  shilling  and  six- 
pence. 

"  So  we  could  not  let  your  friends  know  how 
ill  you  were,  or  where  you  were,"  she  con- 
tinued, pursuing  her  own  thought. 

"I  have  none! — no  matter!"  he  answered 
suddenly.  Then  observing  that  the  old  woman 
looked  curious,  and  the  young  one  pained,  he 
added,  "None  with  whom  you  could  have  com- 
municated— none  in  London — none"  (this  with 
a  great  access  of  feeling)  "  who  would  have 
been  kind  to  me,  as  you  have  been." 

The  girl  looked  pleased.  "I  have  done  what 
I  could,  and  so  has  Rayner." 

Stanley  glanced  gratitude  at  Rayner  on  the 
spot,  but  his  eyes  quickly  went  back  to  the  baby 
face  that  was  so  very  fair,  with  its  look  of  inno- 
cent pleasure  upon  it. 

"  God  will  bless  you  for  your  kindness  and 
your  goodness." 

"You  are  not  to  agitate  yourself,"  she  inter- 
rupted hastily;  "the  doctor  says  you're  not  to 
agitate  yourself." 

"  But  you  must  tell  me "  he  began. 

"No,  sir,  not  now.  Rayner,  his  cooling  draught 


— quicK !    I  must  go  out  now ;  when  I  come  in 
I'll  tell  you  all  about  yourself." 

"And  all  about  yourself  too,"  he  said,  with  a 
smile.  "  Well,  meanwhile  I  shall  obey  you,  and 
not  agitate  myself." 

_"Not  yet— no  questions  yet,"  the  girl  said 
with  a  touch  of  childish  imperiousness  that  was 
as  pleasing  to  look  upon  as  the  rosebuds  on  the 
walls  and  curtains.  "  Don't  leave  him,  Rayner, 
I  shall  take  the  key  and  let  myself  in.  Good- 
bye!" and  with  that  the  vision  was  gone. 

He  looked  after  her  lazily  as  she  flitted  from 
the  room— looked  after  the  slight  girlish  figure 
with  a  languid  wonder  in  his  eyes.  Then  when 
the  door  had  closed  behind  her,  he  drank  the 
cooling  draught ;  then  he  looked  at  the  woman 
those  dewy  lips  had  addressed  as  "Rayner," 
and  observed  that  Rayner  had  pursed  her  own 
aught  but  dewy  lips  up  with  decision,  as  one 
who  was  resolved  that  no  speech  should  filter 
through. 

"Is  that  your  mistress?"  he  asked. 
Rayner  nodded,  and  then  shook  her  head  at 
him  monotonously,  under  the  impression  that 
such  motion  on  her  part  would  conduce  to  his 
quiet,  and  so  to  his  restoration. 

"And  you  are  Rayner?"  he  went  on. 
Again  she  nodded  assent. 
"  Who  is  that  young  lady  ?" 
"My  mistress,  sir." 

The  conversation  ceased  here  for  awhile,  anu 
Stanley  was  conscious  that  he  had  made  small 
— not  to  say  no — progress.  Presently  he  re- 
sumed : 

"  How  long  have  I  been  here?" 
"  My  mistress's  memory  is  better  than  mine, 
and  she'll  tell  you  all  you  want  to  know  when 
she  comes  in,"  Rayner  replied,  with  a  dogged 
nervousness  that  defeated  her  own  amiable  in-  « 
tention,  and  caused  him  to  feel  that  he  must, 
indeed,  have  been  there  a  long  time,  since  she 
dared  not  affix  a  date  to  his  advent. 

"Do  tell  me,  my  good  woman,"  he  said  im- 
ploringly. 

"  Now  don't  you  ask  till  the  doctor  comes  in; 
he  will  tell  you." 

"  When  will  he  come  ? — the  doctor  for  me  /" 
"  He  will  come  to-morrow." 
"  But  you  must  tell  me  this  before  to-morrow," 
he    said    quietly.      "  I    must     know    it  —  at 
once !" 

"  Six  weeks ;  and  Miss  Marian  will  never  for- 
give me  for  telling  you  yet,"  Rayner  answered 
in  a  melancholy  tone. 

"  Six  weeks !  My  God,  six  weeks !"  he  groan- 
ed feebly.  It  was  overwhelming  to  him.  Six 
weeks !  Evil  as  his  case  had  been  before,  it  was 
nothing  compared  to  what  it  would  be  now. 
Six  hours  inactivity  at  that  period,  when  he  left 
off  his  life  as  it  were,  would  have  been  detri- 
mental to  such  miserable  prospects  as  had  been 
his.  But  six  weeks !  It  was  destruction! 

Wearily  he  made  one  more  effort  when  the 
stunning  effect  of  this  blow  had  worn  off  a  trifle. 

"Tell  me  all  you  can— all  that  you  think 
want  to  know,"  he  said  hoarsely. 

Gently,  with   her  toil-hardened    hands,   sh 
smoothed  the  pillow,  with  a  coaxing,  tender 
touch,  that  soothed  him  in  spite  of  himself. 

"  Not  yet,  sir,"  she  said,  with  tears  in  her 
voice;  "not  yet,  dearie! "she  repeated  with  a 
downright  assumption  of  affectionate  authority 


ON  GUARD. 


that  was  very  good  for  him,  desolate  as  he  felt 
himself  to  be. 

He  tried  to  smile  at  her.  Failing  in  that,  he 
moved  his  wasted  hand  against  hers,  and 
seemed  to  himself  to  be  holding  her  in  a  firm 
grasp.  Ah !  how  she  sorrowed  for  his  weak- 
ness as  the  thin  fingers  went  round  and  held 
her  strong  old  hand  in  their  feeble  clasp. 

"Do  tell  me  in  kindness?  don't  make  me 
ask." 

The  piteous  appeal  for  information  respecting 
himself,  from  the  handsome  young  gentleman 
over  whom  she  had  watched  night  and  day, 
with  unremitting  care  and  attention,  for  six 
weeks,  overcame  her  scruples.  So  after  a  few 
more  soothing  touches  had  been  administered 
to  the  pillow  and  to  the  coverlid,  and  after  she 
had  wiped  her  eyes  on  her  apron,  and  apostro- 
phised her  "goodness,"  after  she  had  driven 
him  to  the  brink  of  insanity,  in  fact,  by  her  pre- 
liminaries, she  started  fairly  on  the  story  he 
wanted  to  hear. 

She  told  him  that  Miss  Marian  coming  home 
one  blustering  March  evening,  "between  the 
lights,  as  one  might  say,"  had  been  drawn  to 
the  spot  where  he  was  lying  by  the  howls  of 
the  big  dog.  That  Miss  Marian  had  then  run 
into  her  own  house  (this  abode  in  which  he  was 
at  present),  screaming  out,  "  Rayner,  there's  a 
man  dead  outside!"  That  she  (Rayner)  had 
forthwith  made  the  "poor,  frightened  lamb,"  the 
aforesaid  Miss  Marian,  lie  down  while  she  went 
out  to  investigate.  That  she  found  he  was 
neither  dead,  as  Miss  Marian  had  feared,  nor 
drunk,  as  she  herself  had  first  fancied,  but  faint 
only ;  that  she  half  dragged,  half  carried  him  in, 
and  placed  him  on  a  sofa.  And  that  when  he 
came  out  of  his  faint  he  had  gone  into  a  fever, 
through  which  Miss  Marian  and  herself  had 
nursed  him.  That  was  all. 

That  was  the  extent  of  her  voluntary  infor- 
mation ;  and  he  was  too  weak,  too  weary  to 
ask  for  more,  though  he  longed  to  hear  it.  He 
lay  there  after  she  had  brought  her  brief  narra- 
tive to  a  close,  conscious  only  of  two  things. 
The  one  was  that  he  must  be  up  and  at  that 
tale  of  bricks  that  were  over- due  ere  long — at 
that  odious  work  over  which  he  had  broken 
down;  and  the  other  was  a  faint  desire  to 
know  more  about  "Miss  Marian,"  his  baby- 
faced  saviour. 

The  consciousness  of  these  two  things  finally 
overpowered  him,  and  he  fell  asleep.  When  he 
woke  it  was  night,  the  curtains  were  drawn 
across  the  window,  and  by  the  light  of  the  can- 
dle that  stood  on  the  toilet-table,  he  saw  in  the 
glass  the  reflection  of  her  face  precisely  as  he 
had  seen  it  on  his  first  awakening.  Saw  it,  and 
saw  that  it  was  unconscious  of  his  observation 
— marked  its  expression  of  purity,  and  its  youth, 
and  (being  more  himself  than  he  had  been  be- 
fore) felt  sorrowfully  that  it  was  a  hard  thing 
that  he  should  have  broken  down  at  the  feet 
of  this  girl — a  hard,  a  bad,  a  bitter  thing  for 
some  one — perhaps  for  the  lonely,  baby-faced 
beauty. 


CHAPTER   XXX. 

"  NOT   A  JOT  1     NOT   A  JOT  I  " 

THE  fall  from  his  horse,  and  the  period  he  had 
passed  down  among  the  tadpoles  at  the  bottom 
of  the  brook,  were  insufficient  to  affect  Claude 
Walsingham  unpleasantly  after  a  day  or  two. 
But  though  the  effect  they  had  upon  his  consti- 
tution was  so  small,  their  influence  upon  the 
relations  between  himself  and  his  wife  was 
mighty,  and  bid  fair  to  be  lasting. 

Her  alarm  about  him  had  taught  her  how 
very  dear  he  was  to  her ;  and  the  ravages  that 
alarm  had  made  upon  her,  brief  as  was  the  time 
for  which  she  had  endured  it,  appealed  to  him, 
and  awoke  all  his  slumbering  tenderness  into  a 
fuller  life  than  it  had  known  before.  They 
were  drawn  closer  together  by  this  danger 
which  he  had  escaped,  and  Bella  no  longer 
found  it  dull  at  the  Court. 

All  the  old  joy  which  she  had  felt  in  the  old 
Denham  days,  when  to  feel  it  was  treachery  to 
Stanley  Yillars,  came  over  her  soul  once  more. 
She  marvelled  how  she  could  ever  have  felt 
anything  else  in  Claude's  presence.  She  strove 
to  put  away  the  remembrance  that  she  had 
been  feeling  quite  the  reverse  rather  fervently 
of  late,  as  she  would  have  put  away  an  ugly 
dream. 

In  her  re-awakened  tenderness  for  and  trust 
in  her  husband,  she  too? the  whole  neighbour- 
hood nearer  to  her  heart,  and  forgave  Lady 
Lexley's  existence — a  thing  that  was  the  more 
easy  to  do  as  Lady  Lexley  left  the  Harpers 
about  this  time,  and  crossed  her  path  no  more. 
Still  she  told  herself  that  she  would  have  been 
equalty  magnanimous  had  Lady  Lexley  remain- 
ed, which  proves  that  she  meant  well. 

A  something  called  for  a  celebration  at  the 
Court  at  this  epoch.  Some  one  had  a  birthday, 
or  there  was  a  long  list  of  festivities  to  be  re- 
quited, or  some  equally  cogent  reason  for  giv- 
ing a  ball  arose,  and  stared  Mrs.  Walsingham 
senior  in  the  face. 

It  was  to  be  a  tremendous  affair.  I  may  say 
that  it  was  to  be  a  serious  affair — giving  the 
word  serious  in  its  two  meanings  of  solemn  and 
important.  People  were  coming  to  it  from 
either  end  of  the  county — from  the  extreme 
ends,  even;  and  the  inns  of -the  two  nearest 
country  towns  promised  themselves  that  they 
"  would  be  crowded  to  excess,  and  full  to  over- 
flowing," in  the  columns  of  their  respective 
journals,  for  a  fortnight  previous  to  the  ball. 

Mrs.  Claude  showed  in  her  brightest  colours 
from  the  moment  it  was  first  mooted  up  to  the 
night  of  its  realisation.  She  threw  herself 
heart  and  soul  into  the  scheme,  and  made  Mrs. 
Walsingham  feel  that  after  all  a  daughter-in- 
law  who  liked  gaiety  was  no  bad  thing  to 
have  near  at  hand  when  the  promotion  of 
gaiety  was  the  object  in  view.  Bella  was 
ubiquitous  and  incessant — Bella  rode  and  drove 
about,  and  gave  all  the  orders  for  the  hundred 
and  one  things  that  were  forgotten  day  by  day 
as  the  scheme  progressed — Bella  wrote  all  the 
notes  of  invitation,  checked  off  all  the  accept- 
ances, organised  the  order  of  reception,  vigor- 
ously restrained  unhallowed  hands  from  inter- 
fering with  the  flowers  in  the  conservatory,  by 
which  means  she  secured  a  full  and  plentiful 


ON  GUARD. 


99 


supply  of  the  same ;  and,  in  the  intervals  of 
this  serious  business,  taught  Jack  to  waltz 
without  putting  his  feet  through  his  partner's 
dress  while  she  was  "doing  the  back  steps" — 
a  triumph  of  management  Jack  had  been 
powerless  to  attain  heretofore — in  each  and  all 
of  which  good  works  she  was  applauded  and 
encouraged,  not  to  say  goaded  on  to  greater 
efforts,  by  Claude,  and  jealously  watched  by 
Claude's  sister. 

She  never  thought  of  Stanley  Yillars.  This 
relapse  into  being  "  in  love  "  with  her  husband, 
together  with  the  projected  ball,  entirely  ob- 
scured her  first  lover's  claims  upon  her  memory. 
She  forgot  that  semi-plaintive,  semi-imprudent 
appeal  she  had  made  to  him,  by  writing  to  him 
without  obvious  end  or  aim.  She  forgot  the 
assertion  she  had  made  respecting  their  speedy 
return  to  town  —  a  return  she  had  blithely 
assented  to  deferring  for  no  particular  reason ; 
she  forgot  the  desire  she  had  expressed  to  see 
him.  In  fact,  she  forgot  everything  save  her 
present  happiness  and  her  husband,  which  was 
right  from  one  point  of  view,  and  wrong  from 
another.  It  was  her  "nature  to"  forget  the 
past  when  the  present  was  agreeable  at  all 
points.  It  was  constitutional;  she  may  no 
more  be  blamed  for  it  with  justice  than  one 
may  be  blamed  for  any  other  physical  defect, 
or  applauded  for  any  physical  perfection.  She 
was  neither  heartless  nor  undeserving.  "When 
she  remembered,  she  could  be  as  considerate, 
as  tender,  as  remorseful  for  her  venial  errors, 
as  any  one — only  she  was  very  apt  to  entirely 
forget. 

So,  while  the  weary  weeks  dragged  on  dur- 
ing which  Stanley  Villars  was  wasting  under 
that  fever  of  body  and  soul  of  which  she  was 
the  remote  cause,  she  was  making  preparations, 
with  that  earnestness  which  comes  from  intense 
interest  alone,  for  the  greater  success  of  the  ball 
at  the  Court. 

Grace  Harper  came  into  her  confidence 
greatly,  by  a  series  of  almost  imperceptible 
gradations,  in  these  days.  At  first  Mrs. 
Markham  marvelled,  in  her  own  hard,  honest 
soul,  at  this  intimacy  between  her  spotless 
friend  and  her  brother's  wife.  But  presently 
Grace  explained,  and  made  all  things  clear  in  a 
way  that  enhanced  her  own  merits  in  Mrs. 
Markham's  stern  eyes,  and  depreciated  Bella's 
with  the  most  consummate  tact. 

"  If  I  stand  aloof  from  her  I  may  have  cause 
to  reproach  myself  by-and-by,"  Grace  said,  with 
that  sort  of  stolid  satisfaction  in  the  performance 
of  a  meritorious  though  unpleasant  act  which  it 
is  hard  to  stand  by  and  see  sometimes.  "  She's 
not  congenial  to  me,  but,  at  any  rate,  /  can  do 
her  no  harm,"  she  went  on,  in  a  tone  that  im- 
plied that  Mrs.  Claude  might  do  much  harm  to 
one  who  was  not  encased  in  such  well-tried 
moral  armour  as  she  (Gracie)  wore.  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  received  this  sentiment,  and  endorsed  it 
with  a  bony  kiss  on  the  brow  of  the  "  fair 
brave."  Mrs.  Markham  was  one  of  those 
women  with  their  mouths  full  of  long  teeth 
whose  kisses  have  the  effects  of  bites  on  the 
unprepared  recipient.  But  Grace  was  never 
unprepared  for  any  little  outburst  of  the  kind, 
therefore  she  stood  it — "like  a  man,"  I  was  about 
to  write,  but  far  more  tolerantly  than  any  man 
would  have  done  Grace  was  accustomed  to 


having  Mrs.  Markham's  fangs  gnashed  upon 
her.  In  the  days  gone  by,  she  had  endured  it 
gallantly  because  Mrs.  Markham  was  Claude 
Waisingham's  sister ;  and  a  girl  on  promotion 
will  put  up  with  much  from  the  sister  of  the 
probable  or  possible  promoter.  Now  she  en- 
dured it  for  custom's  sake,  and  because  it  was 
easier  to  go  on  enduring  chronic  unpleasant- 
nesses from  a  neighbour  than  to  rebel  against 
them.  It  may  be  an  uuamiable  thing  on  the 
part  of  the  portrayer  of  her  character  to  lay 
bare  the  causes  which  conduced  to  this  out- 
wardly amiable  quiescence  on  the  part  of  Miss 
Harper;  but,  when  painting  from  the  life,  it  is 
so  hard  to  be  pleasant — one  can  but  see  the 
reason  of  many  bony  kisses  being  patiently 
taken,  if  one  will  but  look. 

Gradually,  it  came  about  that  Miss  Harper 
spent  long  hours  alone  with  Mrs.  Claude  Wal- 
singham,  "  seeking  to  improve  her,  and  give  her 
tone  and  stability."  Mrs.  Markham  opined, 
when  conversing  with  her  mamma  on  the  sub- 
ject, "  Grace's  society  could  but  do  Claude's 
wife  good,"  they  both  averred,  and  as  Bella  took 
to  that  society  very  kindly,  they  began  to  think 
better  things  of  her. 

Gradually,  too,  it  dawned  upon  Bella  that  she 
had,  all  unconsciously,  led  on  by  heaven  alone 
knew  what  unfortunate  combination  of  circum- 
stances, laid  bare  her  whole  soul,  the  complete 
plan  of  her  life,  to  this  plump,  placid  young 
lady,  who  had  told  her  so  little  in  return.  The 
giddinesses  of  her  gushing  girlhood,  the  flighti- 
nesses  before  and  during  her  first  engagement, 
her  meeting  with  Claude  in  that  old  country  inn 
alone  at  night,  her  young  conjugal  distrust  of 
him  when  they  first  came  to  the  Court,  her 
relapse  for  a  few. hours  into  the  ancient  kindly 
feeling  towards  Stanley,  her  repentance  con- 
cerning that  relapse  when  Claude  was  in 
danger,  their  restoration  to  perfect  bliss,  and 
love,  and  trust  in  one  another,  which  was  con- 
temporaneous with  Claude's  restoration  to 
health — all  these  and  many  other  things  Bella 
told  in  full  confidence  to  the  admirable  young 
lady  who  was  so  ready  to  see,  and  deplore,  and 
amend  all  that  was  amiss  in  the  young  wife  of 
the  man  whose  wife  she  herself  had  fully  in- 
tended to  be  for  more  years  than  she  now  cared 
to  count. 

These  friendly  confidences — rather  this  friend- 
ly confidence,  for  it  was  one-sided — had  gone 
on  uninterruptedly  for  ten  days  or  a  fortnight, 
when  one  day,  and  that  the  very  day  before  the 
ball,  it  received  a  slight  shock.  The  pale  devil  of 
jealous  hate  would  not  be  quieted  any  longer ; 
it  rose  up  and  forced  Grace  to  say 

"  Thank  goodness !  when  I  marry  I  shall  not 
live  in  dread  of  any  such  old  memories  being 
brought  to  light !  Poor  girl  I  I  can  understand 
your  being  a  little  nervous  sometimes." 

"  I'm  never  a  little  nervous — and  when  I  am, 
it's  not  that  I'm  afraid  of  any  of  these  '  old 
memories,'  as  you  call  them  ?  "Why  in  the 
world  should  I  be  afraid  of  them  ?  What  non- 
sense I"  The  first  portion  of  Bella's  disclaimer 
was  slightly  contradictory.  Grace  made  Bella 
feel  that  she  marked  its  being  so,  by  shaking 
her  head  and  smiling  in  melancholy  toleration. 

"  Old  memories !  Why,  my  husband  knows 
about  the  worst — I  mean  the  most  important 
things  I  have  been  telling  you  of,"  Bella  went 


100 


OX  GUARD. 


on  pettishly,  feeling  excessively  annoyed  with 
herself  for  having  told  Miss  Harper  anything  at 
all. 

"  Oh !  does  he  ?"  Grace  asked,  elevating  her 
faintly  marked  eyebrows. 

' '  Does  he  ?     Of  course  he  does ! " 

"  Then,  at  any  rate,  you  have  the  satisfaction 
of  feeling  that  you  have  concealed  nothing  from 
him.  Take  my  advice,  though — 1  have  known 
Claude  from  a  boy — don't  you  be  the  one  to 
renew  the  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Villars!" 

Miss  Harper  spoke  in  apparently  absolute 
forgetfulness  of  Mrs.  Claude  having  written  to 
Stanley  Villars—  a  fact  Mrs.  Claude  had  cursori- 
ly alluded  to  three  days  before. 

"  For  what  reason?"  . 

"  Well !  for  many ;  your  quick  wit  will  sup- 
ply you  with  more  in  •&  minute,  if  you  think 
about  it,  than  my  slower  tongue." 

"But  Claude  wishes  to  meet  him  again," 
Bella  said  energetically. 

"  Does  he?"  Miss  Harper  asked  with  a  dubi- 
ous air. 

"  Does  he?  Of  course  he  does  I  Claude  has 
a  generous  nature,  and  he  couldn't  help  feeling 

— though    he  would  never  allow i"  Bella 

stammered  and  stopped. 

"  That's  the  very  reason.  I  quite  feel  with 
you  that  you  could  never  be  the  one  to  bring 
them  together  again,"  Grace  said,  with  a  great 
air  of  frank  sympathy  with  and  appreciation  of 
Bella's  motives. 

"  But  Claude  told  him  the  day  we  were 
married  that  he  hoped  he  would  soon  be  with 
us  again." 

"Poor  Claude!  I  can  understand  how  you 
will  always  shrink  from  putting  him  to  the 
test,"  Grace  said  admiringly.  Bella  felt  pro- 
voked at  being  so  entirely  misconstrued ;  but, 
at  the  same  time,  she  had  grave  doubts  as  to 
whether  it  would  really  be  well  to  make  her 
real  feelings  on  the  subject  patent  to  Miss 
Grace.  She  had  no  thought  of  how  patent 
they  were  already  to  the  unsophisticated  Miss 
Harper.  At  the  same  time  the  influence  of  this 
apparently  guileless  cross-examination  was  to 
make  her  wish  that  she  had  never  indited  that 
letter,  all  harmless  as  it  was,  to  Stanley  Villars, 
or  that  she  had  told  her  husband  that  she  had 
done  so  at  the  time.  It  was  too  late  now.  It 
was  all  trifling.  A  thing  that  was  of  no  ac- 
count one  way  or  the  other.  Still,  for  all  that, 
a  thing  that  she  almost  wished  she  had  not 
done. 

The  two  ladies  had  been  sitting  alone  during 
this  conversation ;  but  soon  after  it  had  reached 
the  point  of  Grace  telling  Bella  that  she  could 
"  well  understand  her  shrinking  from  putting 
her  husband  to  the  test  of  a  meeting  with  Mr. 
Villars,  brought  about  through  her  agency," 
and,  while  Bella  was  giving  in  her  adhesion  to 
this  noble  sentiment,  by  her  silence,  Claude 
himself  sauntered  hi  and  sat  down  by  his  wife. 

"The  conversation  has  foundered,  apparent- 
ly, can't  I  start  it  again  ?"  he  asked. 

"  Well,  no ;  I  don't  think  you  can,"  Bella 
said,  half  laughing,  and  leaning  her  head  on  his 
shoulder  as  she  spoke ;  "  we  had  talked  the 
subject  out.  You  can  give  us  a  fresh  one,  if 
you  please." 

"  I  had  rather  take  up  the  one  you  have  ex- 
hausted, and  say  something  new  about  it,"  he 


said,    merely    for    the  sake    of  saying    some- 
thing. 

"  There  is  nothing  new  to  be  said  about  it, 
Claude,"  Bella  exclaimed  quickly. 

"  Let  me  try ;  what  was  your  theme,  Grace  ?" 
he  continued,  turning  to  the  gentle  blonde,  who 
was  not  greatly  softened  by  the  sight  of  Bella's 
head  burying  itself  on  his  shoulder.  "What 
was  your  theme,  Gracie  ?  Gloves  ?  " 

Grace  Harper  shook  her  head. 

"  What  then  ?  Crosbie's  chances  of  getting 
quit  of  Lady  Alexandrina  and  going  back  to 
Lily  Dale  ?  Bella  takes  a  great  interest  in 
Crosbie ;  I  suppose  you  do  also  ?" 

"No,  I  don't,"  Grace  replied,  almost  sharply. 
She  was  very  much  afraid  the  conversation  was 
about  to  drift  into  space,  just  as  she  had  thought 
it  making  straight  for  a  rock  on  which  Bella 
might  get  broken  up. 

"  I  thought  all  the  women  liked  Crosbie," 
Claude  went  on  carelessly ;  "  they  are  not  quite 
clear  why  they  like  him  ;  but  there  is  a  vein  of 
heartiessness  in  him  that  they  find  pleasant  in 
a  book." 

"I  certainly  am  not  clear  about  the  heart- 
iessness," Bella  put  in.  She  felt  annoyed  with 
Grace  for  not  being  interested  in  the  popular 
current  hero,  added  to  which  she  had  a  min- 
gled feeling  of  tenderness  and  sympathy  for 
Crosbie  as  a  fellow-sinner,  that  rendered  her 
sensitive  to  the  smallest  slur  being  cast  upon 
him. 

"  He  is  worse  than  heartless ;  he's  unprinci- 
pled," Miss  Harper  said  quietly. 

"I  can  only  say  I  don't  see  it,"  Bella  re- 
plied. 

"Oh I  Mrs.  Claude,  I'm  sure  you  do,"  Grace 
said  earnestly ;  "you,  holding  such  sentiments 
as  you  expressed  to  me  just  now,  cannot  think 
a  man  anything  but  unprincipled  who  jilts  one 
girl  and  marries  another,  and  then  wrongs  his 
wife  by  thinking  tenderly  of  the  first." 

"  Of  course,  when  you  put  it  in  bald  hard 
words  it  sounds  very  bad,"  Bella  answered 
warmly. 

"  Have  you  been  giving  way  to  noble  senti- 
ments, old  lady?"  her  husband  asked,  laugh- 
ingly. 

"  I  didn't  know  that  I  had,"  Bella  replied, 
"  at  any  rate  we'll  have  no  more  of  them,"  she 
continued,  hoping  to  change  the  conversation. 

"  They  come  so  naturally  to  her,  you  see," 
Grace  said ;  and,  if  it  had  not  been  the  plump, 
placid,  good-natured  Grace  who  spoke,  Claude 
could  have  fancied  it  was  said  with  a  sneer. 

"  I  hope  they  do !  but  what  were  the  special 
ones,  pet  ?  "  he  asked,  smoothing  the  hair  away 
from  Bella's  forehead.  As  Grace  looked  upon 
them,  she  could  have  cut  her  tongue  out,  quiet 
as  she  seemed,  for  that  it  had  not  already  ut- 
tered words  that  should  have  caused  him  to 
take  that  hand  away. 

"  The  special  ones,"  she  said  slowly,  "  were 
a  veiy  natural  and  profound  contempt  for  and 
distrust  of  any  woman  who  could  have  a 
thought  of  or  communication  with  a  former 
lover,  which  was  not  held  in  common  with  her 
husband.  I  should  have  thought  the  same  onus 
of  honour  was  upon  a  man."  The  last  sentence 
robbed  her  speech  of  all  intentional  bitter  per- 
sonal meaning.  Nevertheless  Bella,  loyal  as 
she  was,  blanched  in  her  soul  as  she  listened. 


ON  GUARD. 


101 


"  I  should  think  so !  I  should  rather  think 
so!"  Claude  said  sternly. 

"What,  Claude?"  Bella ^sked  hurriedly. 

"  Why,  that  it  behoves  a  woman  to  be  ten 
times  more  careful  than  a  man  in  such  a  case," 
he  replied. 

"  That  was  scarcely  the  meaning  of  Miss 
Harper's  remark,"  Bella  said  scornfully. 

"  Wasn't  it,  by  Jove  ?  it  was,  though." 

"  Oh  1  you  mistake  me,  Major  Walsingham, 
if  I  seemed  to  you  to  judge  more  rigorously  of 
a  woman  in  such  a  case  than  of  a  man,"  Grace 
said  softly. 

"  You  would  surely  not  be  more  lenient  to 
her?"  Claude  asked  hastily. 

"More  lenient?  well,  I  hardly  know.  It 
would  be  so  terrible  to  judge,  you  know — to 
decide  against  a  woman,  you  know,  however 
faulty  she  might  be."  Grace  spoke  with  such 
a  frankly  uplifted  faee,  such  a  very  ingenuous 
voice,  that  these  seemed  sweet,  sober  senti- 
ments, not  spiteful  snaps. 

Bella  began  to  feel  indignant.  A  suspicion 
of  there  being  something  in  the  air  that  would 
be  antagonistic  to  her  happiness,  and  to  her 
husband,  had  come  over  her.  But  she  was  not 
quite  clear  where  or  what  it  was.  An  unwary 
woman,  is,  perforce,  at  a  fearful  disadvantage  in 
such  a  warfare  as  this.  The  nobler  the  animal, 
the  more  liable  it  is  to  be  injured  by  attacks 
from  curs  which  it  has  overlooked.  If  one 
would  scent  out  mean  foes  in  time  to  render 
them  innocuous,  one  must  needs  grovel  in  their 
level. 

"  You  take  a  great  interest  in  faithlessness, 
and  conjugal  faultinesses,  Miss  Harper,"  Mrs. 
Claude  said,  trying  to  speak  in  a  sweet,  un- 
affected voice,  and  failing,  even  in  her  own 
ears. 

"  Theoretically,  yes ;  practically,  I  have  had 
no  experience,  you  know,  having  no  brothers 
or  sisters,"  Grace  replied,  with  a  great  air  of 
maiden  innocence  and  virgin  purity.  Bella  felt 
strongly  tempted  to  throw  courtesy  to  the 
winds,  and  the  gauntlet  down,  by  saying,  "  No, 
and  you're  not  likely  to  gain  it  either,  in  your 
proper  person ;"  but  she  restrained  herself.  In- 
stinct sometimes  teaches  us  that  that  suspicion 
which  is  the  result  of  hate  and  theory  is  a  far 
subtler  foe  than  the  offspring  of  experience  and 
practice. 

This  instinct  was  strengthened  within  her  the 
following  night,  when  she  was  dressing  for  the 
ball.  Claude  came  to  her  then ;  and  when  he 
had  sent  her  maid  away  to  get  him  a  cup  of 
coffee,  he  put  his  arms  round  her  and  drew  her 
close  to  him,  and  said — 

"I'm  glad  you  get  on  so  well  with  Gracie, 
Bella  dear ;  slie's  an  uncommonly  prudent,  sen- 
sible girl." 

"Do  I  need  the  companionship  of  such? 
Really,  Claude  L  you're  going  the  wrong  way 
to  recommend  1  our  friend  to  me." 

"  That's  rkrj/f !  be  off  into  a  rage  about  the 
Lord  knows;  Jiat,  for  I  don't!  " 

"  But  I  d'  laude.  I  got  over  her  being 
hurled  at  ml  your  mother's  pet ;  but  as  your 
paragon ! — no, '  never !  " 

There  was  a  slight  infusion  of  jealousy  in  the 
tone  in  which  she  said  this — just  enough  to  be 
pleasing  to  Claude,  who  was  not  entirely  averse 
to  his  pretty  wife  being  a  little  jealous  of  him. 


f  "My  paragon!  my  darling;  as  if  you  be- 
lieved she  was  that !  However,  she's  a  sensible, 
staid,  kind-hearted  girl ;  and  she  likes  you,  and 
she  represents  the  mass  of  public  opinion  down 
here." 

"  Does  she?  "  Bella  made  a  face  at  herself  in 
the  glass,  but  her  husband  saw  it  over  her 
shoulder. 

"You  doubt  it?"  he  asked. 

"  No,  I  don't ;  I  simply  don't  care  for  it,"  she 
replied. 

^  That's  your  mistake,"  he  said;  and  he  said 
it  in  measured  tones  that  portended  wrath  to 
come. 

"Now,  Claude,  don't  be  cross,  and  I  will 
care,"  she  said,  turning  round  hurriedly.  "  How 
do  I  look?  Nice!" 

"As  you  do  always,"  he  replied,  kissing  her. 

"  That's  a  good  boy.  Now,  in  return  for  that 
charming  speech  (oh!  Claude,  what  charming 
speeches  you  used  to  make  to  me!),  'I  will  de- 
fer to  public  opinion,'  if  you'll  tell  me  what  she 


"What 'it 'says;  speak  correctly,  Bella." 

"I  was  speaking  correctly,  for  I  mean  Miss 
Grace  Harper.  How  have  I  transgressed  ?" 

"You  have  not  transgressed." 

"  And  a  word  from  you  will  savo  me  from 
doing  so;  say  the  word,  Claude."  Then  she 
laughed,  and  added,  "  Make  yourself  the  mouth- 
piece of  public  opinion." 

He  flushed  up  to  his  brow  when  she  said  this, 
and  she  tried  to  cool  down  the  flush  with  her 
kisses. 

"Dear  Claude,  I  was  flippant." 

"  Well,  don't  be  so  again,  for  I  can't  stand 
it,"  he  replied. 

She  put  a  diamond  star  in  her  hair,  and 
another  on  her  breast,  and  hummed  a  waltz 
air. 

"Ain't  I  as  'beautiful  as  a  butterfly?'  "  she 
asked,  flashing  round  upon  him. 

"Yes,  and "    He  stopped  abruptly. 

"Finish  your  sentence — 'and  as  frivolous,' 
you  meant  to  say,"  she  cried,  with  her  eyes 
sparkling.  Then  she  remembered  what  pangs 
of  doubt  she  had  suffered  through  him — and 
how  he  had  been  in  danger — and  how  dearly 
she  loved  him,  and  she  held  her  face  and  her 
arms  up  to  him. 

"  Claude  I  what  a  booby  I  am  to  try  and 
make  you  believe  that  I  wouldn't  give  up  any- 
thing, or  do  anything  in  the  world  for  you,"  she 
said,  tenderly. 

"Then  give  up  a  very  little  thing  to-night, 
and  don't  make  yourself  ill  by  tearing  about  in 
any  of  their  waltzes  and  gallops  ?" 

He  asked  this  veiy  affectionately  of  her,  and 
she  desired  to  please  him.  But  these  round 
dances !  She  was  very  fond  of  them.  Fond  of 
them  as  she  was  of  peaches,  and  of  rides  on 
Devilskin,  and  of  Anthony  Trollope's  novels ! 
Why  should  he  ask  her  to  give  up  what  was  so 
harmless  and  so  sweet  ? 

"  They  don't  hurt  me,"  she  said  soberly. 

"They  do  hurt  me,"  he  replied. 

"  Then  don't  dance  them,  dear." 

u  /  dance !  if  I  do,  it  will  be  with  certain 
people  " — ("  So  shall  I,"  she  laughed) — "  with 
whom  I  have  to  do  it,  just  as  certain  other 
marks  of  esteem  and  honour  have  to  be  accord- 
ed them  in  this  house,  /dance !  Gad,  I  should 


102 


ON  GUARD. 


be  devilish  glad  never  to  see  any  more  of  it!" 
His  tone  was  almost  surly  now,  and  her  sweet, 
smiling  visage  fell  as  she  listened  to  him. 

"Very  well,  Claude;  you  shall  see  no  more 
of  it  from  me,"  she  said  softly.  But  she  felt 
that  she  could  have  made  the  concession  ten 
thousand  times  more  blithely,  small  as  it  was, 
had  not  the  firm  conviction  been  hers,  that  it 
was  required  of  her  at  Miss  Grace  Harper's  in- 
stigation. "While  as  for  Claude,  he  was  not 
jealous  of  her,  "not  a  jot,  not  a  jot;"  still  he 
was  well  satisfied  that  it  should  be  patent  to 
the  most  discriminating  beholder  that  he  had  no 
cause  to  be.  Within  the  last  few  days  he  had 
felt  this  remembrance  growing  upon  him — that 
she  had  deceived  another  man — had  lapped  a 
cleverer  man  than  himself  into  security  for 
awhile.  Still  remembering  this,  even  he  would 
not  be  jealous  of  her,  "  not  a  jot,  not  a  jot !" 


CHAPTER    XXXI. 

MISTAKES. 

"He  will  return,  I  know  him  well, 
He  will  not  leave  me  here  to  die." 

WHEN  Stanley  Villars  had  looked,  till  his  eyes 
ached,  at  the  reflection  of  the  girl  who  had 
enacted  the  part  of  good  Samaritan  towards 
him,  he  had  a  strangely  earnest  little  debate 
with  himself  as  to  whether  or  not  he  should  get 
up,  and  away  out  of  her  vicinity  at  once,  before 
she  could  discern  and  arrest  his  intention. 
While  he  was  faintly  arguing  that  it  would  be 
better  that  she  should  go  about  all  her  life  with 
a  black  sense  of  man's  ingratitude  weighing  on 
her  mind,  than  that  she  should  ever  know  him 
as  he  really  was,  or  rather  as  he  believed  him- 
self to  be,  she  saw  that  he  was  awake,  and 
came  up  and  defeated  him. 

The  baby  face  looked  down  upon  him  from  a 
background  of  Rayner,  with  a  very  hopeful 
smile  upon  it.  He  was  much  pleasanter  to  look 
upon  than  he  had  been  during  fever  and  insen- 
sibility. Besides  she  had  a  sort  of  vested  right 
in  him  as  her  own  patient,  and  now  he  began  to 
do  her  credit. 

"I  have  waited  till  you  woke  to  say  good- 
night. Rayner  will  sit  up  with  you  till  you 
have  had  your  sleeping  draught,"  she  explained, 
taking  up  his  hand,  and  giving  it  a  gentle 
friendly  shake  of  extreme  satisfaction.  It  was 
a  very  muscular  hand  which  took  his  in  that 
friendly  clasp,  but  it  was  warm  and  womanly 
notwithstanding. 

"Have  I  been  unfortunate  enough  to  have 
been  the  cause  of  your  staying  up  sometimes  ?" 
he  asked. 

She  nodded.  "I  have  sat  up  half  the  night 
several  times.  Don't  speak;  it  was  nothing. 
Why,  I'd  have  done  it  for  any  one." 

"  How  good  you  are,"  he  murmured,  faintly ; 
he  did  not  feel  nattered  by  the  statement  of 
these  broadly  charitable  views,  for  some  reason 
or  other. 

"Good!  I'm  afraid  I'm  no  better  than  other 
people,"  she  replied ;  but  she  laughed  a  little, 
low,  childlike  laugh  as  she  spoke,  and  her  danc- 
ing eyes  arid  dewy  lips  looked  far  better  and 
mon  innocent  than  any  that  had  come  un- 


der his    ken    since  he   had  parted  with  Flor- 
ence. 

"I  can  tell  you  what  you  are,  and  that's 
tired,"  Rayner  interposed.  "Do  go,  my  dearie! 
do  now,  Miss  Marian." 

"Do,"  Stanley  urged,  warmly  seconding  the 
old  woman's  suggestion,  and  warmly  hating  her 
the  while  for  having  made  it.  ''  Pray  do,  you 
need  rest." 

"Well,  I  will;  but  it  won't  be  to  rest  for 
three  or  four  hours  yet  Good  night." 

Once  more  she  lifted  up  his  hand,  and  gave 
it  that  muscular  clasp  which  corresponded  so 
ill  with  her  soft  baby  face.  Once  more  the  cloud- 
less child's  eyes  looked  out  at  him  confidingly 
from  under  the  clear  brow,  over  which  the  rich 
masses  of  that  glorious  ruddy  hair  clustered. 
Once  more  he  found  himself  being  sorry  for  her. 
and  irresistibly  impelled  to  curse  the  hour  and 
the  fate  which  had  cast  him  athwart  her  path. 

"  Where  is  she  going,  that  she  won't  have 
any  rest  for  hours?"   he  asked  of  Rayner,  as 
soon  as  the  girl  whom  Rayner  called  "Miss^ 
Marian"  had  closed  the  door  behind  her. 

uls  it  Miss  Marian,  sir?"  his  nurse  interro- 
gated, in  a  way  that  made  him  feel  that  he  was 
reproved,  he  scarcely  knew  how  or  for  what. 

"Yes;  where  is  Miss  Marian " 

"  You'd  far  better  not  talk  to-night,  sir ;  take 
my  advice,  and  lie  quiet,"  Rayner  replied,  ear- 
nestly, and  in  simple  faith.  She  was  desirous  of 
nothing  more  than  to  keep  her  patient  calm. 
He  believed  that  she  was  evading  his  question, 
and  so  worried  himself  fearfully  in  seeking  in 
his  own  mind  for  a  reason  why  she  should  do 
so. 

"If  you  would  rather  not  tell,"  he  began; 
and  then  she  interrupted  him,  in  her  deep 
anxiety  that  he  should  remain  entirely  undis- 
turbed, in  order  that  the  opiate  he  had  taken 
might  have  the  due  effect,  and  said  that  she 
"  certainly  would  rather  not  tell  to-night." 
Which  decision  gave  birth  to  a  dread  in  his 
mind  that  grew  to  be  almost  a  tangible  monster 
oppressing  and  maddening  him,  as  the  soporific 
worked,  and  sight  and  sense  were  gradually 
artificially  dimmed. 

It  seemed  to  him  that  the  monster  dread, 
whatever  it  might  have  been,  was  being  charm- 
ed away  after  a  time  by  a  strain  that  welled  up 
to  him  faint  and  low  from  some  other  sphere. 
When  the  notes  first  fell  upon  his  ears,  he 
started  with  a  throb ;  but  presently  he  settled 
the  question  of  "  whence  came  they  ?"  satisfac- 
torily; it  was  fairy  music  from  the  rose-bud 
faces  on  the  walls.  When  he  had  assured  him- 
self of  this  he  left  off  trying  "  to  be"  any  more, 
and  went  away  into  nothingness  without  fur- 
ther effort.  He  was  a  feather  floating  in  an 
atmosphere  of  sweet  sounds ;  he  was  a  rose-leaf, 
with  a  nightingale  for  his  private  property ;  he 
was  Joachim's  own  favourite  violin  ;  he  was  a 
south  breeze  sweeping  o'er  a  bank  of  violets ; 
he  was  a  song  without  words ;  he  was  the  soul 
of  music  at  large  in  Tara's  halls.  In  short,  he 
was  under  the  influence  of  a  powerful  opiate, 
and  some  one  was  playing  the  piano  in  a  room 
at  no  very  great  distance  from  the  one  he  occu- 
pied. 

Late  into  the  night  that  indefatigable  player 
went  on,  practising  the  same  piece — a  tender, 
plaintive  melody  it  was,  with  a  wealth  of  sad 


N  GUARD. 


103 


meaning  in  its  every  chord — over  and  over 
again,  till  the  piano  seemed  to  be  speaking 
the  sad  story  in  the  mother  tongue  of  each  one 
who  heard  it.  And  while  the  strain  went  on, 
and  for  hours  after,  indeed,  till  the  morning  light 
streamed  in  through  the  cloudy  muslin  curtains, 
Stanley  Yillars  continued  to  be  all  those  incon- 
gruous things  mentioned  above. 

He  woke  a  better  man.  Not  morally  better, 
but  physically  better,  and  found  himself  alone. 
Then  he  thought  he  would  get  up  and  dress 
himself,  and  begin  to  think  about  going  away. 
But  when  he  set  about  carrying  out  this  idea, 
by  getting  out  of  bed,  the  floor  made  an  angry 
rush  at  him,  and  when  he  grew  calmer,  he  crept 
humbly  into  bed  again,  acknowledging  that  he 
must  needs  wait. 

The  monster  doubt  which  had  been  put  to 
flight  by  the  combined  effects  of  the  opiate  and 
the  music  was  about  to  resume  its  sway,  and 
make  him  unhappy,  when  Rayner  came  in  with 
his  breakfast,  and  banished  it  again.  He  drank 
*his  tea  and  ate  his  toast  with  the  feeling  one  is 
apt  to  have  after  a  long  illness,  that  this  life, 
namely,  is  well  worth  retaining — if  it  be  only 
for  the  sake  of  the  tea  and  toast  which  may 
be  denied  to  us  in  the  next.  It  was  a 
very  material  reflection;  but  it  was  born  of 
returning  health.  The  rose-leaf  and  soul-of- 
music  notions  came  of  sickness  of  spirit  and 
drunkenness  from  opium.  The  gracious  accep- 
tance of  the  goods  that  were  going  was  a  very 
good  sign. 

He  did  not  question  the  old  servant  further 
about  her  young  mistress.  He  spoke  of  him- 
self now,  telling  her  that  it  was  essential  that 
he  should  be  up  and  doing  as  soon  as  possible, 
and  that  he  should  relieve  them  of  the  burden 
of  his  presence  before  the  day  was  many  hours 
older;  which  insane  idea  Rayner  was  far  too 
deeply  versed  in  the  weaknesses  of  the  invalid 
rnind  to  attempt  to  combat,  but  encouraged, 
rather  as  a  thing  that  might  be  if  lie  would 
only  make  a  good  breakfast,  and  not  exert  him- 
self to  say  too  much. 

But  though  she  gave  such  a  cordial  assent  to 
his  plans,  they  were  not  carried  into  execution 
on  that  day,  nor  the  next,  nor  for  many  a  suc- 
ceeding one.  Not  only  did  he  feel  that  it  would 
be  well,  when  he  came  to  see  himself  in  the 
glass,  that  he  should  look  less  like  an  attenuated 
and  broken  reed  before  he  ventured  into  the 
haunts  of  men,  but  the  floor  continued  to  rush 
madly  up  at  him  whenever  he  essayed  to  stand 
upon  it.  Therefore,  for  awhile  he  gave  up  the 
contest,  and  ceased  from  his  efforts  to  stand 
upon  it  at  all. 

When  he  was  able  to  get  out  of  his  room  he 
found  that  it  was  a  mere  doll's-house  of  a  place 
which  had  been  his  haven  of  refuge.  A  neat, 
trim,  tiny,  fanciful  bit  of  a  place,  that  gave  itself 
up  to  having  one  "good"  bed-room,  which  he 
had  occupied,  cheaply  furnished,  but  pretty  and 
graceful  notwithstanding — strangely  like  the 
girl,  its  mistress,  in  fact. 

He  had  learnt  all  that  there  was  to  be  learnt 
of  the  divinity  before  seeing  the  rest  of  the 
shrine.  The  "  all "  was  prosaic  enough.  She 
was  "  first-hand"  at  a  second-rate  milliner's  es- 
tablishment, and  she  made  enough  by  her  la- 
bours to  keep  this  diminutive  roof  over  the  head 
of  the  woman  who  had  nursed  her  mother  in 


her  dying  illness,  and  her  own.  Her  ideas  on 
the  subject  of  her  paternity  were  undefined,  but 
exalted.  Her  mother  had  kept  an  inn.  There 
was  no  romance  to  be  extracted  from  her  sur- 
roundings. But  Marian  had  heard  that  her 
father  was  a  gentleman,  and  that  she  resembled 
him  strongly  in  beauty  of  person.  That  was 
all  she  knew  about  him,  and  all  she  knew  she 
believed. 

The  pretty  little  milliner,  the  baby-faced 
beauty,  was  a  thing  to  study.  She  had  her 
ambitions,  her  hopes,  her  aspirations,  and  she 
confided  them  all  to  him.  She  had  a  deep  gen- 
uine love  of  music,  and  lately  she  had  saved 
enough  from  her  salary  to  buy  an  old  piano,  and 
take  lessons  of  a  lady  who  had  fired  her  with 
the  idea  of  being  "  professional"  in  time.  "  She 
was  no  more  than  me  at  one  time,"  she  said, 
simply,  "and  now  she's  quite  the  lady,  and  goes 
out  to  play  at  grand  houses,  and  goes  down  to 
supper  with,  the  best." 

Her  lovely  blue  eyes  dilated  at  this  glorious 
prospect  in  such  a  bewitching  way,  and  the 
mouth  that  uttered  these  words  looked  so  op- 
posed in  its  refinement  to  the  vulgarity  of  the 
sentiment  enunciated,  that  he  could  but  study 
her  with  interest,  and  suffer  her  to  perceive  that 
he  did  so.  The  race  was  low,  the  breed  was 
bad ;  the  manners  and  customs  by  which  she  had 
ever  been  surrounded  probably  were  against 
her,  and  still  the  true  artist  feeling  was  there. 
It  was  mixed  with  lower  and  more  paltry  ones, 
unfortunately;  but  it  was  there,  nevertheless, 
a  vein  of  fine  gold  in  a  coarse  soil. 

He  was  warmly  and  earnestly  interested  in 
her.  Who  would  not  have  been  in  such  an 
anomaly  as  she  was?  Who  would  not  have 
been  interested  in  that  fragile,  tender,  childish 
loveliness,  marred  as  it  was  by  the  manner  of  a 
self-sufficient  little  show-girl?  Who  would  not 
have  been  interested  in  that  rich  vein  of  artist 
feeling  which  was  choked  and  buried  beneath 
so  much  that  was  paltry  and  little  ?  To  hear 
her  one  moment  playing  some  piece  that  was 
far  beyond  her  executive  powers  as  yet,  with  a 
depth  and  intensity  of  feeling  that  blinded  one 
to  all  mechanical  errors ;  while  in  the  next  she 
would  be  raising  her  voice  exultantly  at  the 
thought  of  being  fitted  in  time,  through  her 
fingers,  for  admission  into  the  drawing-rooms 
of  these  whose  dressing-rooms  alone  were  open 
to  her  now !  He  was  warmly  interested  in  the 
baby-faced  beauty ;  but  though  there  was  much 
tenderness,  much  pity  in  that  interest,  there  was 
not  a  grain  of  passion.  The  glorious  beauty  of 
her  hair,  the  childlike,  delicate  loveliness  of  her 
face  and  form,  might  have  won  upon  his  man's 
heart  had  she  never  spoken.  But  the  sweet  lips 
were  their  own  antidote  as  soon  as  they  parted. 
What  that  genuine  artist  feeling  might  do  for 
her  in  time  he  could  not  tell.  At  present,  the 
little  beauty  was  more  than  a  little  vulgar. 

His  clearness  of  vision  on  this  point  could 
have  been  a  safeguard  to  him,  even  had  he  not 
been  possessed  of  another,  in  his  vivid  remem- 
brance of  Bella.  But  the  baby -faced  beauty  had 
no  such  safeguard,  and,  in  his  gratitude,  he  was 
very  kind. 

The  generous  little  creature  had  been  ready, 
a}r,  eager,  to  take  care  of  him>— to  tend,  and 
succour,  and  perhaps  restore  him,  when  he  was 
nothing  to  her  but  a  fellow-oreature  in  distress. 


104 


OX  GUARD. 


She  had  denied  herself  necessaries,  and  im- 
poverished herself  cheerfully,  never  thinking  for 
an  instant  that  there  was  aught  out  of  the  way 
in  her  doing  so  during  his  illness.  It  would 
have  been  just  the  same  to  her— she  would 
have  done  as  much,  with  a  willing  hand  and 
heart — had  it  been  an  infant  or  an  old  wo- 
man whom  she  had  found  by  the  roadside  that 
night.  Her  generous  charity  was  pure  enough, 
only,  unfortunately,  the  object  of  it  chanced  to 
be  a  young,  handsome  man. 

He  was  not  a  selfish  man,  but  his  early  train- 
ing had  not  prepared  him  for  giving  much 
thought  to  small  sordid  things.  He  had  no  idea 
of  how  many  sacrifices  she  had  been  compelled 
to  make  for  him,  and  of  how  surely  she  was 
coming  to  love,  through  having  thus  sacrificed 
and  suffered  for  him.  In  his  own  mind  he  was 
quite  resolved  that  the  dear  little  thing,  with 
the  honesty  of  purpose,  and  the  artist  feeling, 
and  the  unfortunate  inability  to  be  a  lady,  should 
be  well  repaid  for  all  she  had  done  for  him  some 
day  or  other.  He  little  knew  how  impossible 
it  would  be  for  him  ever  to  repay  her,  save  in 
a  way  that  would  be  odious  to  himself.  She 
was  as  pleasant  and  as  dear  to  him  as  a  kitten, 
but  he  felt  no  repugnance  to  the  plan  when  she 
told  him  that  an  artist  had  begged  her  to  sit  to 
him  as  a  model  for  "  Hetty"  in  her  first  meeting 
with  "  Arthur  Donnithorne." 

By-and-by  the  day  came  when  he  could  leave 
her — leave  the  sanctuary  where  she  had  held 
him  secure — without  fear  of  the  floor  playing 
wild  antics.  He  was  much  better,  he  was  nearly 
well,  and  he  found  that  strength  was  given  him 
to  go  back,  and  take  up  the  burden  of  life  again. 
at  the  spot  where  he  had  laid  it  down  before 
going  out  for  that  fatal  walk. 

So  Rock  and  he  removed  themselves  from  the 
tiny,  fanciful,  pretty  doll's-house,  and  the  doll 
went  to  her  work  with  swollen  eyes  and  a  heavy 
heart  that  day.  At  night,  she  came  home  and 
sat  down,  at  once  playing  her  saddest  strains, 
till  the  faithful  old  woman,  who  was  half-friend, 
half-servant,  and  whole  blind  devotee  of  hers, 
took  heart  of  grace  to  whisper  that  "  he  would 
come  again." 

Thus  the  thin  veil  of  secresy  which  had  been 
long  between  them  was  swept  away,  and  the 
girl  told  to  the  woman,  who  knew  it  already — 
told  to  her  own  heart,  which  trembled  at  hear- 
ing the  truth  spoken — that  she  loved  the  stran- 
ger whom  she  had  saved. 

The  gloomy  room  in  the  grim  house,  that 
was  so  conveniently  situated,  seemed  duller 
and  drearier  than  ever  when  he  went  back  to 
it,  and  his  landlady,  kind  and  cordial  as  she 
essayed  to  be,  according  to  her  lights,  was  as 
harsh  and  unbending  as  his  fate,  when  con- 
trasted with  those  two  women  who  had  been 
his  nurses  for  more  than  seven  weeks.  He  had 
no  time  to  waste  in  drawing  comparisons,  how-- 
ever.  There  was  much  work  over  due,  and  he 
put  his  feeble  shoulder  to  the  wheel  manfully, 
and  tried  to  do  it. 

The  necessity  of  working  hard  while  the 
faintest  power  of  work  is  left  in  one,  is  apt  to 
make  many  a  well-meaning  man  appear  ne- 
glectful and  careless  of  his  best  friends.  The 
impossibility  of  concentrating  one's  whole  facul- 
ties on  a  wearisome  thing  that  must  be  done, 
and  at  the  same  time  of  attending  to  various 


little  conventionalities,  to  which  it  behoves 
civilized  man  to  attend,  is  an  impossibility,  that 
those  who  neither  toil  nor  spin  find  it  hard  to 
realise.  It  is  a  hard  thing  to  be  affable  when 
straining  every  nerve  for  existence — next  to. 
impossible  to  be  polite  while  purchasing  future 
popularity,  prosperity,  or  the  power  of  living  on 
at  all,  at  the  price  of  all  current  peace  of  mind 
and  body. 

Still  there  are  some  things  which  have  such 
a  holy  claim  upon  humanity,  that  we  blush  for 
the  latter  when  those  claims  are  overlooked. 
It  was  the  force  of  circumstances ;  it  was  the 
result  of  that  sad  war  he  had  been  so  unwisely 
wrought  upon  by  disappointment  to  wage ;  it 
was,  for  all  this,  inexcusable  on  the  part  of 
Stanley  Yillars  to  grind  on  wearily,  unremit- 
tingly, for  a  fortnight,  at  his  loathsome  task, 
without  giving  a  thought  to  the  brave  little 
beauty  whose  good  Samaritanism  was  likely  to 
cost  her  very  dear. 

I  have  said  how  she  went  to  her  work  when 
he  was  gone,  with  swollen  eyes  and  a  heavy 
heart,  and  how,  when  she  came  home  at  night, 
she  played  the  saddest  strains  her  skill  could 
draw  from  the  keys.  She  might  have  indulged 
plenteously  in  this  last  pastime  with  impunity. 
Artistically  speaking,  it  did  her  good  indeed,  for 
it  ("it"  being  that  sensation  about  him  which 
was  the  offspring  of  her  care  for  him)  taught 
her  to  play  with  feeling  and  expression !  Who 
cares  for  the  cause  when  the  effect  is  admira- 
ble ? 

But  though  her  artist-life  was  enriched  by 
this  experience  of  the  loving  arid  riding  away 
habits  of  mankind,  her  working-life  was  impo- 
verished, not  to  say  endangered.  Swollen  eyes 
and  a  heavy  heart  were  matters  of  small  mo- 
ment when  she  was  sitting,  with  Rayner  for 
an  audience,  making  the  shrill  piano  discourse 
most  eloquent  music ;  but  swollen  eyes  and  a 
heavy  step  in  the  show-room  of  the  west-cen- 
tral Mantalini  for  whom  she  worked,  were  grave 
offences. 

She  had  other  qualities  essential  to  a  success 
in  "the  millinery,"  as  she  called  it,  in  addition 
to  her  ingenious  fingers  and  nice  taste  in  the 
disposition  of  ribbons,  and  laces,  and  flowers. 
She  had  a  gracefully  poised  head,  and  a  lissom 
form,  and  these  two  things  disposed  of  many  a 
mantle,  wreath,  and  scarf.  There  was  a  limber 
ease  about  her  manner  of  putting  on  and  off 
these  things,  for  their  better  inspection  by  pos- 
sible purchasers,  that  induced  the  credulous  to 
believe  that  the  grace  was  in  the  garment. 
But  in  these  days  of  which  I  am  writing  the 
limber  ease  deserted  her,  and  the  sale  grew 
stagnant  in  the  show-room,  and  a  briny  tear 
had  been  seen  to  fall  from  her  clear  blue  eyes 
down  on  to  a  fragile  idea  she  was  carrying  out 
in  tulle  for  a  querulous  customer. 

The  poor  baby-faced  beauty !  She  had  no- 
thing in  her  home  life  to  distract  her  thoughts 
from  dwelling  all  too  fondly,  all  unwisely,  on 
the  one  who  had  broken  up  the  calm  current  of 
that  life,  and  caused  it  to  seem  so  miserably 
wanting  without  him.  She  had  taken  an  inno- 
cent child's  innocent  pleasure  before  in  playing 
at  keeping  a  house  of  her  own,  and  in  believing 
that  she  was  doing  it  all  by  herself — a  belief 
which  Rayner  fostered,  keeping  things  straight 
the  while  in  an  earnest  matter-of-fact  way,  that 


ON  GUARD. 


105 


came  from  her  romantic  devotion  to  the  loving 
beauty  of  the  girl  who  was  as  dear  to  her  "  as 
her  own  flesh  and  blood  could  have  been,"  she 
said.  Now,  alas!  that  innocent  pleasure  was 
a  pale  memory  only — a  flat,  insipid  thing,  that 
had  been — that  was  all ! 

The  home  life  was  insufficient,  and  the  fresh- 
ness of  the  beauty  was  fleeing  under  the  influ- 
ence of  alternate  hope  and  despair.  Brightly 
every  morning  did  she  hope  that  she  would  see 
him  again  before  nightfall ;  bitterly  each  night 
did  she  bewail  the  falsity  of  that  hope.  There 
was  nothing  mean  in  the  hope — nothing  un- 
generous in  the  regretful  despair.  She  never 
gave  one  single  thought  to  aught  that  she  had 
done  for  him.  She  never  reproached  him  in 
her  innermost  heart  with  ingratitude  or  thought- 
lessness towards  one  who  had  thought  well  for 
him.  She  only  sighed  to  see  him  again,  be- 
cause she  loved  him. 

When  a  fortnight  or  so  had  passed,  the  cur- 
rent of  those  thoughts  of  hers,  which  were  un- 
doubtedly dwelling  far  too  exclusively  on  him 
for  her  own  good,  was  disturbed.  A  whisper 
had  reached  her  employer  that  there  was  "a 
cause "  for  that  change  in  her  which  was  so 
detrimental  to  the  business.  A  perverted  state- 
ment— in  which  truth  was  so  entangled  with 
falsehood,  that  she,  in  her  confusion,  hardly 
knew  which  was  which — was  abroad  respecting 
her;  and  as  she  had  been  the  brightest  star  in 
that  little  firmament,  there  were  many  who 
gloried  in  her  fall. 

It  was  a  rigorously  respectable  establishment. 
]  Its  mistress  hM  not  always  been  a  milliner,  but 
.  she  had  seen  the  error  of  her  ways  when  a  good, 
remunerative  opportunity  of  amending  them 
offered,  and  so  now  was  unequalled  in  the 
promptitude  with  which  she  saw  the  error  of 
other  people's.  Had  the  dark  whisper  respect- 
ing Marian  not  been  contemporaneous  with  the 
swollen  eyes,  the  heavy  step,  and  the  loss  of 
limber  ease,  the  estimable  woman  would  not 
have  hearkened  thereunto.  As  it  was  she  felt 
that  it  behoved  her  to  hear  and  to  act  "  like  a 
Christian,"  she  said.  Accordingly,  after  rating 
Marian  Wallis  till  the  poor  girl's  cheeks  tingled 
with  anger,  and  her  soul  with  a  sense  of  bitter 
injustice,  she  dismissed  her  without  a  character, 
on  the  strength  of  sundry  whispered  words. 

Poor  baby-faced  beauty !  She  went  back  to 
the  little  house  which  she  had  played  at  keep- 
ing, with  her  cheeks  hot  with  such  shame  and 
fury  as  must  bring  down  God's  curse  upon  the 
sister  woman  who  can  cause  it.  She  went  home 
feeling  herself  stained  by  the  foul  suspicion  that 
had  fallen  upon  her,  by  the  foul  words  in  which 
that  cruel  suspicion  had  been  given  voice — 
went  home  and  hid  herself,  as  though  she  had 
been  the  thing  they  said,  and  would  not  hear 
the  voice  of  comfort  that  her  faithful,  fond  old 
friend  elevated,  and  would  not  seek  solace  in 
the  strains  she  loved — went  home  and  piteously 
bewailed  herself,  like  the  child  she  was ;  but 
never  once,  even  in  her  childish  wrath,, had 
other  than  a  softly  tender  thought  for  the  man 
through  whom  this  sorrow  had  come  upon  her — 
by  whom  she  was  forgotten. 

For  she  told  herself,  now  that  she  was  for- 
gotten by  him — and  as  she  deemed  him  as 
beautiful  and  as  high  above  her  as  a  star,  she 
simply  thought  it  in  the  order  of  things  that  she 


should  be  so, — it  was  no  fault  of  his  that  he, 
being  a  gentleman,  should  regard  her  as  lightly 
as  the  majority  of  the  great,  according  to  her 
experience,  appeared  to  regard  the  very  small. 
So  she  excused  him  to  herself,  crouching  down 
under  her  sorrow,  with  no  thought  of  that  rich 
gift  of  loveliness  which  was  hers,  and  which  a 
queen  might  have  envied. 

She  turned  a  little,  burning  ear  of  unbelief  to 
Rayner's  tales  of  startling  reappearances  after 
long  absences,  and  longer  apparent  forgetfulness 
than  this  which  their  late  patient  was  display- 
ing. Rayner's  stories  were  all  of  the  King 
Cophetua  and  Lord  of  Burleigh  order.  She  was 
always  bringing  Stanley  Villars  back  to  her 
young  mistress's  feet  under  circumstances  more 
or  less  gorgeous.  Coaches  and  four— to  say 
nothing  of  an  army  of  servants,  in  and  out  of 
livery — played  a  prominent  part  in  the  pro- 
gramme of  procession  she  constantly  insisted 
upon  arranging  outside  the  doll's-house  door— a 
procession  that  was  to  be  formed  in  honour  of 
Miss  Marian,  when  the  man  she  had  nursed 
should  return  in  the  state  of  splendour  that  was 
natural  to  him  to  bear  that  mistress  away.  But 
these  pictures  had  no  effect  upon  Marian ;  she 
would  not  look  upon  them.  Sadly  poor  old 
Rayner  felt  that  they  were  painted  in  vain. 

One  soft  May  evening,  coming  home  after  a 
weary  day  passed  in  seeking  employment,  and 
finding  none,  the  big,  tawny  setter  bounded 
forth  from  the  door  to  meet  her.  Going  in  with 
a  rush,  and  a  cry  of  such  delight  as  might  not 
be  subdued,  she  found  him — the  bright  stranger 
— in  their  little  room,  and  Rayner  standing  talk- 
ing to  him,  and  crying,  as  was  customary  with 
Rayner  when  she  was  agitated. 

"My  poor  little  Marian!  my  dear  little 
nurse!  what  you  have  suffered  through  me!;' 
he  said,  in  a  deep,  thrilling  tone,  as,  together 
with  Rock,  she  nearly  fell  through  the  door- 
way into  his  arms.  Suffered  !  There  was  no 
trace  of  suffering  in  her  face  now.  "  He  had 
returned — he  had  not  left  her  there  to  die !" 
Oh,  glorious  sun  of  youth,  and  love,  and  hope  ! 
Such  intense  bliss  as  the  girl  felt  in  that 
moment  repays  one  for  years  of  sorrow  and 
despair ! 


CHAPTER  XXXIL 

WHO  WROUGHT  THE  WRONG? 

A  FEW  months  have  passed  since  that  soft  May 
evening  which  restored  happiness  and  Stanley 
Villars  to  poor  little  Marian  Wallis.  It  is 
August,  and  the  Claude  Walsinghams  are 
thinking  of  going  out  of  town. 

The  sweet  peace  that  was  their  portion  just 
after  Claude's  accident — that  was  hanging  over 
them,  in  fact,  like  a  mantle  when  we  saw  them 
last — had  been  disturbed  when  we  met  them 
again.  Mrs.  Markham  had  accompanied  them 
when  they  left  the  Court — accompanied  them 
sorely  against  Bella's  will — and  during  the 
whole  of  her  visit  she  had  justified  Bella's  re- 
pugnance to  having  her  at  all,  by  being  very 
observant  and  disagreeable. 

Stanley  Villars  had  called  on  them  once.  It 
was  on  the  occasion  of  his  visit  that  peace  took 


106 


ON  GUARD. 


the  opportunity  of  fleeing.  His  visit  had  been 
paid  shortly  after  their  return  to  town,  as  had 
been  originally  intended.  It  was  August  be- 
fore he  saw  them. 

Claude  was  not  with  his  wife  when  her  old 
lover  was  admitted  to  his  presence,  but  Claude's 
sister  was  sitting  with  Bella,  irritating  her 
nerves  by  cutting  the  leaves  of  a  new  book 
slowly  and  methodically,  and  with  a  grating 
sound  that  was  simply  intolerable. 

All  those  confidences  which  had  leaked  from 
Bella  during  those  hours  of  idleness  she  had 
known  with'  Miss  Harper  had  been  zealously 
passed  on  by  that  sweet  girl  to  Mrs.  Markham. 
From  the  moment  she  had  heard  them,  Mrs. 
Markham  had  been  on  the  alert  to  catch  Bella 
tripping  even  so  slightly,  "for  love  of  Claude." 
Therefore,  now  when  Stanley  Villars  came  into 
the  room,  she  mounted  guard  at  once  in  a 
palpable  way,  that  would  have  caused  Bella  to 
evince  confusion  at  the  entrance  of  a  saint  with 
whom  she  had  never  had  love  passages,  or 
indeed  met  at  all. 

Fondly  and  fervently  did  Mrs.  Claude  hope 
that  oblivion  or  discretion  would  keep  Stanley 
from  making  any  mention  of  that  innocent 
letter  which  she  so  bitterly  repented  having 
written.  But  poor  Stanley,  feeling  miserably 
conscious  now  that  he  was  in  her  presence 
again,  that  the  wound  she  had  made  was  as 
fresh  as  the  day  it  was  given — feeling  moreover 
that  he  had  taken  a  step  of  which  she  was  still 
ignorant,  and  so  was  there  in  a  measure  under 
false  pretences — mooted  the  subject  of  that 
miserable  letter,  as  a  drowning  man  clutches  at 
a  straw. 

''I  had  a  bad  fever  just  after  I  heard  from 
you:  it  laid  me  up  for  six  or  seven  weeks,"  he 
said,  striving  hard  to  speak  to  her  as  he  would 
speak  to  any  other  woman,  and  failing. 

Mrs.  Claude  was  not  one  to  grow  nervous 
and  excited  before  the  enemy,  and  she  felt  that 
her  husband's  sister  was  her  enemy  now. 

"That  was  bad — Claude  will  be  so  sorry 
when  he  comes  in,"  she  said  quickly. 

"  Claude  will  doubtless  have  wondered  why 
his  letter  was  not  answered,"  Mrs.  Markham 
remarked  grimly. 

Mr.  Villars  looked  at  the  last  speaker  quietly 
for  a  moment  or  two,  and  then  glanced  quickly 
at  Bella's  blushing  face.  He  saw  that  he  had 
made  some  mistake,  but  he  did  not  know  what 
his  mistake  had  been. 

Bella's  old  reverence  for  his  perfect  truthful- 
ness uprose  at  once  as  he  looked  at  her,  and 
banished  temporarily  her  dread  of  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  and  mischief. 

"  It  was  of  my  letter,  not  Claude's,  that  Mr- 
Villars  spoke,  Ellen,"  she  explained,  in  such  a 
cool,  firm  voice  that  Mrs.  Markham  was  more 
than  half  inclined  to  think  well  of  her.  Then 
Mrs.  Markham  remembered  the  relations  that 
had  existed  between  the  man  who  was  before 
her  and  her  brother's  wife,  and  conquered  the 
half-inclination — like  a  woman. 

"  Oh,  indeed !  your  letter !  "  she  said,  in  such 
a  tone  that  Bella  felt  she  was  on  her  trial. 

"  And  what  have  you  been  doing  since 
your  illness?"  Mrs.  Claude  asked,  with  a 
slight  fall  in  her  voice — a  sympathetic  inflex- 
ion that  she  could  not  restrain,  as  her  eyes  fell 
on  the  altered  worn  face  and  habiliments  of 


the  man  whom  she  had  once  been  going  to 
marry. 

"  Since  then !  G-od  knows,  I  can  hardly  tell," 
he  replied  drearily.  "My  life  would  hardly 
interest  you — I  mean  any  of  my  old  friends,  I 
fancy." 

"  Is  it  so  changed,  Stanley  ?" 

The  deep,  true  woman's  pity  that  would  well 
up,  as  she  marked  pitifully  how  changed  it  was, 
would  make  itself  heard  in  her  tone. 

She  could  but  remember  how  different  he 
had  been ;  she  could  but  remember  who  had 
changed  him  thus. 

He  dared  not  risk  a  repetition  of  that  pitying 
tone.  He  dared  not,  for  his  own  sake,  and  for 
hers,  and  for  the  sake  of  one  other  whose  heart 
would  break  to  know  him  moved  by  it.  So  he 
answered  carelessly — recklessly  almost — 

"It's  a  life  made  up  of  excitements,  of  which 
you  fashionable  people  can  have  no  concep- 
tion." 

"  You  were  one  of  us  not  so  long  ago,"  Mrs. 
Claude  exclaimed  unguardedly.  She  could  not 
bear  to  hear  him  abjure  his  class  in  this  way. 

"  But  I'm  not  one  of  you  now ;  therefore  I 
have  no  time  to  be  idle,"  he  said  hurriedly. 
Then  he  rose  up  and  said,  "  Morning  calls  were 
not  much  in  his  way,  therefore  he  should  like 
to  see  Claude,  as  he  might  not  be  able  to  come 
again," 

Bella  went  to  look  for  her  husband  in  order 
that  she  might  be  free  from  observation  for  a 
few  moments.  He  was  so  horribly  altered  !  so 
sadly,  so  painfully  altered!  She  would  have 
given  much  not  to  have  seen  him  at  all,  since 
she  saw  him  thus.  She  would  have  given 
much  to  have  been  able  to  drug  the  conviction 
to  rest  that  she  had  caused  that  change. 

"  Stanley  Villars  is  here,  Claude,"  she  said 
abruptly,  opening  the.  door  of  the  room  where 
her  husband  sat  writing ;  but  not  putting  her 
face  in,  or  suffering  him  to  see  it.  "  Come  and 
speak  to  him,  will  you  ?" 

He  got  up  instantly.  "Stanley  Villars! — 
I'm  coming." 

"  You'll  hardly  know  him,"  she  said,  turning 
away  and  walking  along  the  hall  before  Claude 
when  he  came  out.  Then  they  went  in  toge- 
ther to  the  room  where  Stanley  was  awaiting 
them,  and  attempted  to  be  cordial  and  uncon- 
strained, and  failed — failed  miserably ! 

Soon  Stanley  went  away.  It  was  the  best 
thing  he  could  do,  considering  all  things. 
Claude  stood  looking  out  of  the  window  and 
whistling  for  a  minute  or  two  after  his  depart- 
ure. Bella  sat  with  her  elbows  on  the  table 
and  her  hands  supporting  her  chin,  gazing  in- 
tently at  vacancy,  and  not  finding  the  view 
agreeable. 

"  What  a  change ! "  she  said  impatiently  at 
last.  "  Claude,  ain't  you  sorry  ?''  She  asked  it 
eagerly.  Stanley  Villars  seemed  so  far  removed 
from  her  now,  changed  as  he  was,  that  she 
dared  to  speak  of  him  eagerly  and  freely  to  her 
husbacd. 

"  He's  a  complete  wreck,"  Claude  replied, 
rather  mournfully.  He  was  feeling  more  than 
he  cared  to  make  manifest,  for  this  man  whose 
plan  of  life  lie  had  spoilt. 

"  He  looks  as  if  he  drank,"  Mrs.  Markham 
put  in  quietly.  "  Your  plan  of  a  renewal  of 
intercourse  with  him  won't  do,  I  fear,  Bella." 


ON  GUARD. 


107 


"Why  not?  had  Bella  any  plan?"  Claude 
asked  vaguely. 

"  I  thought  at  one  time  it  would  be  pleasant 
to  see  and  be  friendly  with  him  again,"  Bella 
replied.  "  I  have  given  up  that  idea  now." 

"  So  she  wrote  to  him,  as  he  mentioned  just 
now,  when  he  was  telling  us  about  his  fever," 
Mrs.  Markham  went  on,  with  much  simplicity, 
but  keeping  a  keen  watch  on  her  sister-in-law 
the  while. 

"  You  wrote  to  him  ?"  Claude  interrogated, 
turning  round  and  frowning  a  little ;  "when?" 

"  Oh  !  long  ago,"  Bella  replied,  crimsoning  up 
to  her  very  brow  with  anger  at  his  tone  and  his 
sister's  interference. 

"  What  did  you  write  to  him  for  ?" 

"  To  tell  him.  that  we  should  be  glad  to  see 
him." 

"I'm  not  glad  to  see  him  as  he  is  now," 
Claude  said,  harshly.  "  Why  didn't  you  tell  me 
that  you  had  written  ?" 

Mrs.  Markham  nodded  her  head  at  noth- 
ing, as  though  she  were  saying,  "  Why  not  ? 
Why  not,  indeed?"  The  gesture  annoyed 
Bella. 

"  It  did  not  occur  to  me  to  tell  you,  Claude," 
she  replied  coldly.  Had  they  been  alone  she 
would  have  made  free  confession — have  told 
him  why,  and  how  that  letter  was  written,  and 
how  penitent,  not  to  say  remorseful,  she  had 
been  about  it  often  since.  But  not  now;  not 
with  Mrs.  Markham's  stony  eyes  watching,  and 
Mrs.  Markham's  stony  heart  judging  her. 

"  I  should  have  been  better  pleased  then  if 
it  had  never  occurred  to  you  to  launch  out  in 
condemnation  of  the  very  thing  you  have  done 
— writing  to  a  man  without  your  husband's 
knowledge,"  he  said  gloomily.  "  It  was  a  piece 
of  deceit  I  should  never  have  believed  you 
would  have  been  guilty  of,  Bella." 

"  Don't    believe    it    now "   she    began 

eagerly ;  but  he  would  not  listen  to  her ;  but 
went  away,  leaving  Bella  alone  with  his  sister, 
who  proceeded  to  improve  the  occasion,  till 
Bella  felt  that  a  brace  of  murders  and  a  success- 
ful attempt  at  arson  would  have  lain  more  light- 
ly on  her  soul  than  did  this  letter  which  had 
cropped  up  against  her  thus  unexpectedly.  This 
innocent  letter — indited  without  guile,  but  all- 
sufficient  to  wreck  her  nevertheless. 

She  would  not  stoop  to  defend  herself  to  Mrs. 
Markham.  She  would  not  attempt  to  offer  any 
explanation  as  to  the  creative  cause  of  that 
epistle.  Mrs.  Markham  was  striving  earnestly, 
according  to  her  light,  to  arrest  the  progress  of 
this  disease  with  which  she  firmly  believed  her 
sister-in-law's  mind  to  be  infected,  and  she  had 
not  the  art  to  keep  her  instruments  from  the 
eyes  of  her  patient.  She  believed  that  it  behov- 
ed her  to  cut  deep  to  cure,  and  so  she  had  no 
false  delicacy  about  letting  the  one  to  be  cut  see 
the  knife ;  that  was  all ! 

"  If  every  tiny  thing  of  this  sort  that  comes 
up  is  to  create  a  coldness  between  Claude  and 
me,  well !  the  sooner  things  come  to  a  climax, 
and  I'm  'frozen  out'  altogether,  the  better," 
Bella  exclaimed  at  last,  taking  up  arms  abrupt- 
ly, and  breaking  off  patient  endurance  with  a 
snap. 

"  It  being  an  error  on  your  part,  and  your 
being  far  too  sensible  not  to  be  fully  conscious 
that  it  is  an  error,  it  would  be  more  becoming,  to 


say  the  least  of  it,  Bella,  if  you  regarded  the 
consequences  in  a  more  patient  spirit." 

Mrs.  Markham  cut  through  the  sides  and  top 
of  a  sheet,  as  she  spoke,  with  a  sliding,  sure 
motion,  and  a  grating  relentless  sound  that 
made  Bella's  blood  run  cold.  For  about  the  • 
first  time  in  her  life,  Bella  felt  that  she  must 
not  give  way  to  impulse.  For  about  the  first 
time  in  her  life  she  calculated  the  effect  the 
speech  she  was  going  to  make  would  have  on 
her  hearer.  While  Mrs.  Markham  continued 
cool  and  self-possessed,  the  power  was  hers, 
palpably,  of  stinging  Bella  into  making  the  most 
unwary  speeches.  To  shatter  that  self-posses- 
sion by  fair  means,  if  possible — by  foul,  if  fair 
failed  her— was  the  first  task  Bella  set  herself  to 
achieve. 

"  '  It  being  an  error  on  my  part  ?'  Do  you 
really  think  me  in  error  when  I  feel  hurt  at  my 
husband  being  cold  to  me  ?"  she  asked,  with  a 
simple  earnestness,  which  Mrs.  Markham  hated 
her  for,  feeling  sure  that  it  was  assumed  for  her 
discomfiture. 

"You  are  wilfully  misunderstanding  me, 
Bella,"  she  began  angrily.  "I  did  not  mean 

that  it  was  an  error " 

"  I  thought  you  didn't  mean  it,  though  you 
said  you  did,"  Bella  interrupted.  "I'm  glad 
you  acknowledge  that,  Ellen.  I  have  no  liking 
for  misunderstandings." 

"  If  you  will  attow  me  to  speak,"  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  resumed  nippingly. 

Bella  expressed  interrogatory  astonishment 
with  her  eyes  and  shoulders. 
"Why  not?"  she  asked. 
"  I  was  saying  when  you  stopped  me,"  Mrs. 
Markham  said,  severely,  in  a  tone  that  would 
have  been  very  telling  had  Bella  not  seen  her 
fingers  nervously  working  between  the  leaves 
of  the  volume  she  held  on  her  lap — "I  was 
saying,  when  you  stopped  me,  that  it  being  &\\ 

error " 

"  Excuse  me,  you'd  said  that  before,"  Bella 
said,  shaking  her  head  and  looking  intensely 
interested;  "that  was  where  you  started.  I 
know  how  annoying  it  is  to  lose  one's  thread — 
I  often  do ;  but  you'll  remember  what  you  want 
to  say  presently." 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  spoke  with  pro- 
voking calmness.  She  hardly  knew  herself  why 
she  parried  the  blow  her  sister-in-law  was  evi- 
dently bent  upon  dealing.  In  the  end  she  could 
gain  nothing  by  a  brief  delay — a  temporary 
warding  off  of  that  blame  from  which  she 
shrank.  But  then  women  love  to  fence  with 
fate,  and  Bella  Walsingham  was  a  thorough 
woman. 

;( Pardon  me — I  know  perfectly  well  what  I 
am  going  to  say — if  you  will  be  polite  enough 
to  listen  to  me,"  Mrs.  Markham  said,  with  such 
severity  that  Bella  rose  up  saying,  "Excuse 
me,  I  will  listen  another  time.  Claude  will  be 
^oing  out  almost  directly,  and  I  must  see  him 
before  he  goes."  Her  intention  of  seeking  her 
tiusband,  however,  failed  her  when  she  got  out 
nto  the  hall  and  found  the  door  of  his  room 
closed.  It  seemed  to  be  closed  more  especially 
against  her,  she  thought,  so  she  went  away 
moodily  to  her  own  chamber  to  be  miserable  ; 
and  Mrs.  Markham,  marching  after  her  unseen, 
marked  the  failure  of  that  intention,  and  put 
down  the  swerving  from  the  declared  pur- 


108 


ON  GUARD. 


pose  as  another  proof  of  Bella's  "confirmed 
duplicity." 

Claude  Walsingham,  when  he  found  him- 
self alone,  had  first  asked,  in  a  hot  mutter, 
"  "Why  the  devil  Bella  shouldn't  write  to  Stan- 
ley if  she  liked  ?  It  was  like  Ellen's  malicious 
spite  to  think  it  fishy — and  to  try  and  make 
him  think  it  so  too.  He  had  perfect  confidence 

"  Then  he  paused.  Truth  to  tell,  ho 

had  not  perfect  confidence  in  Bella.  It  had 
been  his  misfortune — it  would  be  his  misery — 
not  to  have  perfect  confidence  in  any  woman. 
Then  he  asked  himself,  "Why  the  devil  she 
should  write  to  Stanley  Villars — and  be  con- 
foundedly sly  and  confused  about  it  ?  It  was 
fishy  and  no  mistake,  and  he  had  been  an  ass 
to  marry." 

The  angry  young  husband  had  no  pity  now 
for  the  old  friend,  the  more  than  brother,  who 
had  gone  to  the  dogs  before  that  prowess  of  his 
(Claude's),  which  had  never  failed  him  with 
women.  He  had  no  pity  for  him.  On  the  con- 
trary, he  had  a  certain  feeling  of  disgust  for  the 
man  who  looked  "like  a  cad,"  and  was  at  the 
same  time  the  recipient  of  a  letter  from  Bella, 
the  contents  of  which  were  a  sealed  book  to 
him,  her  rightful  lord.  He  had  no  pity  for  the 
changed  man;  no  kindly  desire  to  learn  the 
cause  of  the  change — the  immediate,  common- 
place cause— and  ameliorate  it  if  possible.  He 
told  himself  that  Stanley  Villars  was  "  turning 
out  very  badly  (precisely  as  those  fellows  who 
commence  by  being  pious  prigs  invariably  do 
turn  out),  and  that  Bella  was  as  deceitful  as 
was  usual  with  her  sex."  But,  for  all  these 
unpleasant  convictions  respecting  both  of  them, 
"  By  God,  I'll  have  none  of  Ellen's  interfe- 
rence!" he  added  morosely.  "I  can  guard  my 
own  honour  better  than  a  dozen  old  women  can 
do  it  for  me!"  Mrs.  Markham  would  have 
been  sorely  grieved  had  she  known  that  her 
brother  included  her  in  the  list  of  those  whose 
assistance  he  despised,  and  whose  youthful  in- 
telligence and  efficacy  he  doubted.  Claude  was 
not  wont  even  to  "  think  "  unseemly  things  of 
the  sex — unseemly  things  relating  to  their  age 
and  appearance,  that  is.  But  to-day  he  was 
very  much  aggrieved.  He  had  "shown  jea- 
lous "  before  his  sister,  and  he  could  not  forgive 
his  sister  for  having  witnessed  the  sight. 

He  determined  to  put  down  anything  like  an 
approach  to  former  intimacy  with  Stanley  Vil- 
lars. with  the  strong  hand  of  common  sense  and 
marital  authority.  On  the  occasion  of  his  mar- 
riage he  had  been  "a  romantic  ass,"  he  called 
himself  now.  It  had  been  an  unwise — an  ex- 
traordinarily generous,  but  desperately  unwise 
thing  on  his  part  to  press  upon  Stanley  the 
office  which  made  Stanley  appear  so  noble  and 
self-sacrificing,  so  loftily  resigned,  in  Bella's 
eyes.  A  sensible  woman  would  have  thought 
Stanley  an  idiot,  under  the  circumstances,  for 
accepting  that  office.  But  he  began  to  fear 
that  Bella,  with  all  her  charm,  was  not  a  sensible 
woman — not  sensible  enough,  at  least,  to  think 
Stanley  Villars  an  idiot. 

He  was  not  jealous — he  assured  himself  that 
he  was  not  jealous ;  but  it  behoved  him  to  take 
care  of  Bella,  and  not  subject  her  to  the  temp- 
tation of  seeing  Stanley  Villars  look  woe-begone 
and  blighted  on  her  account.  He  remembered 
that  women  were  very  weak,  very  liable  to  be 


affected  by  the  sight  of  certain  things  that  were 
utterly  repulsive  to  a  man.  In  masculine  eyes, 
Stanley's  abnegation  of  -all  things,  his  dolour 
and  despair,  were  simply  imbecile.  In  Bella's 
dazzled  orbs  they  would  probably  appear  in- 
teresting. 

Besides,  he  had  another  reason  for  not  caring 
to  see  much  of  Stanley.  He  had  amused  him- 
self to  his  heart's  content  with  Florence  for 
several  months ;  and  there  was  a  look  in  Stan- 
ley's face  very  often — he  had  remarked  it  vividly 
to-day — that  reminded  him  of  Florence  in  a 
way  he  did  not  care  to  be  reminded  of  her.  A 
rumour  had  reached  him  that  Florence  had 
never  been  so  sweetly,  softly  glowing  and 
bright,  since  that  time  at  Denham.  His  heart 
told  him  the  reason  why;  and  he  wished  to 
banish  the  remembrance  of  what  she  had  been, 
and  the  reflection  of  what  she  might  be.  She 
would  marry  in  time,  there  was  no  doubt  of 
that ;  but  till  she  did  marry  and  exhibit  a  sur- 
face happiness,  he  would  rather  not  see  a  face 
that  brought  hers,  in  its  saddest  aspect,  to  his 
mind.  He  was  not  more  subject  to  remorse 
than  are  the  majority  of  men,  but  he  did  feel  its 
throes  sometimes  about  Florry  Villars. 

In  recalling  past  passages  with  numberless 
fair  daughters  of  the  land,  reprobation,  happily 
for  him,  mingled  largely  with  his  remorse. 
They  had  been  as  ready  to  take  as  he  to  give. 
They  had  surrendered  without  discretion.  They 
had  been  reliant  and  kind;  and  when  he  left 
them,  he  left  no  blank — his  place  had  been 
filled  precipitately.  But  with  Florence  it  had 
been  different.  The  welcome  she  had  blushed 
for  him  had  been  blushed  for  none  other.  The 
light  that  love  for  him  had  lit  in  her  eyes  had 
not  been  rekindled  yet.  She  had  been  very 
fond !  so  had  many  another  woman.  She  had 
been  very  faithful !  and  in  that  he  believed  her 
singular. 

He  did  not  see  his  wife  again  till  they  sat 
down  to  dinner  at  seven ;  and  then  the  soup 
was  far  from  clear,  and  he  was  not  far  from 
cross.  Bella  had  forgotten  her  fears  of  mischief 
ensuing  from  Mrs.  Markham's  active  endeavours 
to  keep  her  straight,  and  had  recovered  her  ani- 
mation in  a  way  that  was  not  pleasing  to  him, 
since  he  had  not  recovered  his.  She  wanted  to 
talk.  There  was  nothing  very  reprehensible 
in  this.  Her  subject,  however,  was  ill  chosen  : 
out  of  no  bravado,  but  rather  out  of  a  very 
gentle  feeling  of  good  will  towards  the  man 
who  had  loved  her  so  much  better  than  she 
deserved,  she  selected  Stanley  Villars  as  her 
theme. 

"  Have  you  been  riding,  Claude  ?"  she  began. 

He  shook  his  head,  "  No." 

"  Where  then  ?  the  club  ?" 

"  I  went  in  there,"  he  replied,  in  a  constrained 
tone,  as  if  her  asking  the  question  were  an  in- 
fringement of  the  liberty  of  the  subject  which 
he  scorned  to  resent,  and  still  could  but  mark. 

"  I  didn't  go  out  at  all,"  she  said,  looking  up 
with  a  blithe  expectation  of  his  being  interested, 
that  he  would  respond  to  by  word  or  glance. 
"  I  didn't  go  out  at  all,"  she  repeated. 

"  Then  I  think  you  were  wrong, ;  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  put  in  quickly. 

"  Ah !  you  often  think  me  wrong,"  Bella  re- 
plied laughing.  "  But,  Claude !  don't  you  won- 
der what  kept  me  in  such  a  bright  day?" 


«  TCoallv   T 


ON  GUAED. 


109 


Really  I  had  not  marvelled  very  much 
about  it,"  he  said,  without  looking  at  her.  She 
could  but  remember  how  he  had  looked  at  her 
once — with  what  eager  love — with  what  pas 
sionate  pleading !  Well  I  she  was  his  wife  now, 
It  was  her  duty  to  put  up  with  his  altered  looks : 
to  win  them  back  to  their  original  softness,  if 
she  might.  After  all,  this  reserve  on  his  parl 
might  only  be  the  effect  of  fatigue.  He  was 
weak  still,  perhaps ;  may  be  he  had  not  quite 
recovered  the  accident  which  had  threatened  to 
rend  him  from  her.  At  the  thought  all  her 
tenderness  arose,  and  she  went  on  making  her 
subtly  sweet  efforts  to  win  him  to  a  gentler 
bearing. 

"Well,  I  didn't  go  out  to-day,  because ' 

"  You've  told  us  that  twice,"  dear,"  he  inter 
rupted. 

"  Because  I  sent  out  for  that  magazine — the 
Metropolitan.  You  know,  Claude,  that  Stanley 
Villars  writes  for  it." 

"  I  should  hope  that  imbecility  that's  '  to  be 
continued'  isn't  Stanley's  ?"  Claude  asked  lan- 
guidly. 

"  The  story  that's  running  in  it  is  his,"  Bella 
replied,  trying  not  to  show  that  the  contemptu- 
ous condemnation  of  it  in  anywise  affected  her, 
and  failing. 

"I'm  really  astonished  at  Stanley's  conde- 
scending to  write  such  maudlin  rubbish ;  the 
fellow  has  talent  of  a  certain  kind,  but  he  is 
wasting  it  and  throwing  himself  away  entirely," 
Claude  remarked  with  an  air  of  superiority,  that 
Bella,  remembering  certain  things,  girded  at  in 
her  soul. 

"Why  does  he  do  such  things,  since  it  is 
evidently  not  his  vocation?"  said  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham. 

"  A  little  because  he  does  it  well,  and  a  little 
because  there  was  nothing  else  for  him  to  do,  I 
suppose,"  Bella  replied  shortly. 

Claude  smiled  superciliously.  "  My  dear  Bella, 
Stanley  Villars  ought  to  thank  the  Lord  that  all 
men  who  could  '  do  it  well '  don't  set  about 
doing  it  at  once ;  if  they  did,  he  and  his  com- 
peers would  be  in  a  sorry  plight,  I'm  thinking." 
"  And  wasn't  there  anything  else  for  him  to 
do?"  Mrs.  Markham  asked  suspiciously. 

"  How  should  there  be  when  he  didn't  stay 
in  the  Church  ?"  Bella  answered,  with  a  lack  of 
relevancy  that  was  reasonable  under  the  cir- 
cumstances. 

"  The  whole  thing  lies  in  a  nutshell,  and  is 
not  by  any  means  so  gloriously  uncommon  as 
you  seem  to  think  it,"  Claude  explained.  "  He 
got  tired  of  slow  promotion — dozens  of  men  do 
that — and  he  fancied  that  he  was  a  genius,  and 
would  make  himself,  famous  by  his  pen  if  he 
cast  himself  upon  literature  entirely.  The  de- 
lusion is  common  enough." 

"  Foolish  young  man !  How  very  unpleasant 
for  his  family!"  Mrs.  Markham  remarked. 

"  Then  why  don't  his  family  do  something 
better  for  him?"  Bella  said  it  with  warmth, 
and  was  instantly  made  to  feel,  by  the  depres- 
sion of  her  husband's  eyebrows,  that  she  had 
been  unwise  to  do  so. 

"  It  is  unpleasant  for  his  family.  However, 
he'll  get  tired  of  the  Bohemian  brotherhood  by- 
and-by,  and  then  Gerald's  interest  will  set  him 
on  his  legs  again.  He's  a  nice  fellow ;  but  there 
is  an  atmosphere  of  gin  and  water  about  the 


band  he  belongs  to  at  present  that  it  may  be  as 
well  to  avoid." 

Claude  strove  to  speak  in  a  monotone  expres- 
sive of  absolute  unconcern.  He  slightly  over- 
did it,  unfortunately.  His  wife  saw  through 
the  effort  he  made,  and  was  so  sorry  for  him 
and  for  herself  that  he  should  think  it  necessary 
to  make  one  at  all  in  this  matter.  "  He  might 
trust  me,  and  feel  a  little  as  a  man  should  feel 
for  Stanley,''  she  thought,  and  her  heart  swelled 
painfully.  Now  that  she  had  come  in  contact 
with  Stanley  again,  now  that  this  contact 
brought  her  to  her  mind  once  more,  she  did  so 
fervently  desire  that  Claude  should  go  with  her 
in  making  what  atonement  might  be  made  to 
the  man  they  had  both  wronged  and  wrecked. 

"An  atmosphere  of  gin-and- water  1  that's  a 
hard  thing  to  say  of  Stanley  Villars,  Claude," 
she  said  softly. 

"  And  I'm  sorry  to  say  it ;  but  it's  one  of  the 
conditions  of  the  life  he  is  leading— those  fel- 
lows all  use  themselves  up,  and  the  more  brains 
they  have  the  faster  they  go." 

"  Then  you  think  he'll  '  go,'  as  you  call  it  ?" 
she  asked,  anxiously. 

"  His  appearance  this  morning  rather  favours 
that  supposition,"  he  replied.  The  conversation 
was  eminently  distasteful  to  him.  There  were 
servants  in  the  room,  and  he  felt  that  they  were 
listening  with  understanding;  still  he  could  not 
turn  it,  or  stop  Bella,  or  refrain  from  saying  se- 
vere things. 

"  His  appearance  this  morning  rather  favours 
that  supposition."  Bella  repeated  those  words 
to  herself,  and  she  felt  that  they  were  very  cold 
words— that  they  were  words,  indeed,  which  it 
ill  became  Claude  to  use  with  reference  to  Stan- 
ley Villars.  However  low  the  latter  might 
have  fallen,  it  ill  became  the  man  who  had,  in 
a  measure,  caused  that  fall,  to  condemn  or  be 
caustic.  She  gave  a  quick  sigh,  that  was  half 
pain  and  half  anger,  and  asked — 

"Do  you  remember  what  he  was  at  Den- 
ham?" 

"  An  intense  bore  about  matters  parochial," 
Claude  replied. 

"I  don't  know  that,"  Bella  rejoined — not 
quite  truthfully,  it  must  be  admitted,  since,  as 
has  been  seen,  the  discussion  of  matters  paro- 
chial had  occasionally  bored  her  in  those  Den- 
ham  days — "I  don't  know  that;  but  he  was 
very  earnest." 

"As  earnest  as  he  is  now  in  running  the 
orthodox  career  of  a  press-man  of  to-day." 

"  As  earnest  as  he  was  in  love,"  she  .said, 
quietly.  "  Shall  we  go  into  the  drawing-room, 
Ellen  ?"  Then  she  marched  off  in  her  sister-in- 
law's  wake,  witli  a  heart  that  was  very  heavy, 
and  very  repentant  as  to  that  parting  shot. 
But  she  could  not  keep  the  peace  when  Claude 
disparaged  Stanley — when  the  victor  was  un- 
generous to  the  victim. 

All  through  that  evening  she  perused  and 
reperused,  with  an  interest  that  was  intensely 
aggravating  to  her  husband,  those  pages  of  the 
Metropolitan  which  Stanley  had  penned.  She 
tried  to  trace  him  through  his  work,  as  the 
weak  and  the  wise  alike  persist  in  doing  when- 
ever they  chance  to  know  a  luckless  writer  in 
the  flesh. 

Constantly  as  she  read  her  brow  flushed  and 
er  lips  quivered.  The  light  regard  for  women, 


110 


ON  GUARD 


the  disbelief  in  truth,  the  doubt  of  honour,  the 
damning  dread  of  being  deceived  at  every  turn, 
— good  God !  of  what  had  all  this  been  born  ? 
Her  conscience  answered  that  question;  and 
still  she  read  and  re-read,  and  asked  it  again. 


CHAPTER  XXXIII. 

DOMESTIC  BLISS. 

WHILE  Bella — his  lost  love,  the  sweet  rock  on 
which  he  had  split,  the  wife  of  his  friend,  the 
one  woman  in  the  world  to  him— was  wran- 
gling with  her  sister-in-law  and  wrestling  with 
her  own  spirit,  Stanley  Yillars  was  walking 
slowly  home  through  the  dry,  dusty  streets, 
with  his  eye-balls  burning  and  his  temples 
feeling  painfully  compressed,  and  a  general 
sensation  over  him  of  having  been  up  all  the 
previous  night,  and  of  having  to  be  up  all 
through  the  night  to  come. 

He  was  very  glad  when  he  got  away  from 
the  precincts  of  the  Walsinghams'  house,  which 
was  situated  in  a  region  where  he  might  at  any 
moment  come  upon  any  member  of  his  old  set 
— at  Princes  Gate,  namely.  The  walk  across  the 
park  was  pleasant  enough  in  itself,  but  there 
were  -too  many  people  still  in  town  for  him  to 
walk  there  freely  now.  He  sneered  at  himself 
for  giving  a  thought  to  such  things;  but  he 
was  conscious  of  whiter  seams  than  were  well 
in  his  coat,  and  of  a  certain  limpness  about  his 
hat  that  was  aught  but  seemly  in  that  place. 
He  despised  himself  for  doing  it ;  but  still  he 
did  avert  his  eyes,  or  abstractedly  study  the 
ground,  whenever  a  carriage  approached  whose 
occupants  might  possibly  know  him. 

AVhen  he  reached  the  Marble  Arch,  he  heav- 
ed a  sigh  of  relief  for  that  he  was  nearing 
home ;  not  that  home  was  a  pleasant  place  to 
him,  or,  indeed,  one  from  which  he  would  not 
have  abstained  for  ever  could  he  have  done  so 
in  honour,  but  simply  because  he  was  physi- 
cally worn  out,  and  he  could  not  afford  a  cab. 
Besides,  there  was  a  shady  side  to  the  streets 
through  which  his  way  lay,  and  he  could  keep 
on  that  side,  and  so  be  more  likely  to  evade 
observation. 

There  had  been  no  slight  courage  in  that  de- 
termination which  carried  him  over  Claude 
Walsingham's  threshold.  He  was  a  worn, 
haggard,  shabby  man  now,  and  he  clearly  saw 
himself  to  be  what  he  wag.  It  was  no  light 
thing  to  show  himself  in  such  a  plight  to  those 
t\vo.  But  he  did  it  because  he  yearned  so  to 
see  them  again ;  and  because  he  hoped  that  he 
should  see  that  there  was  no  longer  semblance 
of  a  cause  for  that  appeal  which  he  had  fancied 
he  detected  in  Bella's  letter. 

He  had  not  found  the  meeting  pleasant.  He 
had  never  anticipated  its  being  that,  indeed; 
but  it  had  been  wanting  in  so  much  that  should 
have  been  there.  Bella  had  been  what  she 
always  must  be ;  her  nature  would  not  admit 
of  her  being  other  than  warm  and  womanly. 
But  Claude's  manner  had  said  plainly,  "  My 
dear  fellow,  you've  put  yourself  out  of  the  pale. 
Can  I  do  anything  for  you  ?  If  so,  mention  it ; 
if  not,  the  sooner  we  part  the  pleasanter  for 
both  parties." 


He  thought  over  this  manner  of  Claude's; 
he  looked  at  it  in  every  light  as  he  shambled 
along  Oxford  street.  I  'use  the  word  shamble 
advisedly;  the  gait  indicated  by  it  is  not 
uncommon  in  men  who  have  been  utterly 
worsted,  and  who  still  have  to  keep  going, 
loathing  the  onus  humanity  lays  upon  them  of 
struggling  for  life,  envying  the  desolate  dogs 
who  lie  down  in  the  gutter  and  die  at  their 
ease. 

"  Perhaps  after  all  Claude  was  right."  He 
tried  to  think  him  right,  for  their  ways  of  life 
were  so  different ;  they  were  so  utterly  sepa- 
rated in  reality  that  occasional  communion  in 
seeming  could  only  prove  painful  to  both.  But 
after  all  that  had  come  and  gone,  by  the 
memory  of  their  boyhood,  by  the  pleasure  and 
the  pain  they  had  been  to  one  another,  by  the 
love  they  both  had  felt  for  one  object,  by  the 
doubt  and  agony,  by  the  thousand  nameless 
things  which  had  been  and  were  not,  Claude's 
manner  of  showing  him  this  should  have  had 
more  manliness  in  it. 

Presently  he  turned  out  of  Oxford  Street  to 
the  right,  and  shortly  came  to  a  street  near  the 
Strand  that  had  a  living  pattern  of  infant 
Arabs  in  its  centre,  and  a  border  of  broken 
windows,  in  the  majority  of  which  there  were 
attractive  announcements  respecfing  accommo- 
dation for  single  men.  It  was  a  disheartening 
street !  How  vividly,  with  what  frightful  force, 
it  contrasted  with  the  surroundings  of  the  house 
at  which  he  had  been  calling ! 

The  day,  bright  as  it  had  been  beyond, 
seemed  gloomy  in  this  street.  The  sun  did  not 
find  it  worth  his  while  to  smile  upon  so  dolefu 
a  corner  of  the  earth.  There  were  a  vast  num 
ber  of  women  moving  hither  and  thither  in  it 
in  that  marvellous  manner  peculiar  to  the  se: 
in  these  shades — of  appearing  to  be  going  fo. 
something  which  they  are  not  likely  to  get. 
There  was  a  man  with  a  flute  and  a  wry  neck 
walking  its  length  to  his  own  sorrowful  strains. 
There  were  several  dispirited  cats,  whose  case 
was  too  sad  for  them  to  care  to  keep  their  paws 
clean.  Beyond  these  there  were  no  signs  of 
life  in  the  street  down  which  Stanley  Villars 
walked  to  his  own  door. 

When  he  reached  it  he  gave  an  impatient 
knock ;  he  was  eager  to  get  in,  and  no  wonder. 
The  position  he  occupied  while  waiting  for  ad- 
mission was  not  an  agreeable  one  for  a  mode- 
rately sensitive  man.  Sundry  heads  came  out 
of  the  windows  of  the  houses  immediately 
adjoining  his  own  on  either  side,  and  a  woman 
came  on  to  the  door-step  of  the  opposite  dwell- 
ing, affording  her  infant  sustenance  in  the  most 
Arcadian  manner,  the  while  she  called  to  him 
that  his  "good  lady  had  gone  out  and  left  the 
latch-key  with  her,  and  would  he  excuse  her 
crossing  with  it,  her  feet  being  that  swelled 
with  the  heat  that  she  could  scarce  stand,  far 
less  walk." 

He  crossed  over  and  got  his  key,  and  returned 
with  it,  cursing  his  degradation  with  deep  and 
bitter  oaths.  His  hand  trembled  to  such  a  de- 
gree that  he  had  difficulty  in  getting  the  key 
into  the  door,  and  a  street  boy  marked  his 
bungling  efforts  and  chaffed  him  freely  on  the 
subject  in  the  street-boy  style. 

He  opened  it  at  last  and  got  into  his  own 
house,  to  the  place  that  was  his  sole  sanctuary 


ON  GUARD. 


Ill 


— his  home.  A  narrow,  little,  stifling  passage 
led  to  a  low,  stifling,  little  room,  in  which  there 
was  dust  and  disarray  and  stuffiness ;  and  yet 
despite  all  these,  some  trifling  evidences  of  a 
woman's  presence.  A  long  table  in  the  corner 
covered  with  papers,  books,  and  slips,  with 
stubby  pens  and  grimy  ink-bottles,  with  uncor- 
rected  proofs,  with  recent  novels  to  review, 
with  suspicious-looking  letters,  over  which  there 
was  that  unwholesome  shade  of  blue  which 
bespeaks  the  bill,  with  dust  and  dead  flies,  with 
the  pitiable  litter,  in  fact,  which  distinguishes 
the  careless,  uncared-for  "  literary  man's"  writ- 
ing-table. A  little  piano  in  a  recess  by  the 
fireplace,  a  workstand  near  it,  and  a  low  lounge 
chair  and  footstool  in  close  proximity  to  the 
stand,  indicating  a  woman's  presence  habitually 
in  that  room — a  round  centre-table,  with  a 
soiled  green  cloth  very  much  awry  upon  it — a 
few  despondent  chairs  that  seemed  to  say,  "  Sit 
upon  me,  do ;  but  I'm  very  uncomfortable" — 
pale  green  chintz  curtains  to  the  windows,  that 
looked  as  though  they  had  been  put  to  that  test 
which  Shetland  shawls  proudly  assert  they  can 
stand,  namely,  being  passed  through  a  ring — a 
small  effort  at  colour  and  cleanliness,  in  the 
shape  of  a  pink  paper  cut  into  a  honeycomb  pat- 
tern and  draped  round  a  chimney-glass,  that 
gave  the  rash  one  who  gazed  in  it  one  swollen 
cheek  and  one  oblique  eye — an  abrupt  cessation 
from  all  such  effort  immediately  the  precincts 
of  that  paper  were  passed, — this  was  all  Stanley 
Villars  found  when  he  got  home  that  hot  Au- 
gust day. 

Heavily  he  drew  a  chair  along  to  the  side  of 
that  table  in  the  corner,  and  sat  down,  trying 
to  fall  to  his  work  without  further  thought. 
He  was  a  machine  for  turning  out  copy  now. 
Every  moment  of  his  time — every  effort  of  his 
brain — was  brought  up,  and  pretty  well  paid 
for  on  the  whole.  He  had  a  hard  day's  work 
before  him  on  the  next  month's  instalment  of 
that  novel,  the  earlier  chapters  of  which  Bella, 
was  contemporaneously  perusing.  By  the  time 
that  was  done  he  would  be  due  at  the  office  of 
the  daily  paper  for  which  he  wrote;  but  the 
season  was  dull  just  then,  and  there  was  every 
chance  of  his  soon  being  released,  instead  of  the 
latest  telegrams  bringing  such  news  as  would 
compel  him  to  sit  up  half  the  night  writing  a 
leader  that  should  be  utterly  passed  over  by 
many,  and  superciliously  criticised  by  more,  at 
the  breakfast  tables  of  the  great  majority,  on 
the  following  morning. 

But  he  could  not  work.  The  horror  that 
crept  over  him  as  he  felt  that  the  time  was 
stealing  away,  weighting  every  minute  to  come 
with  a  ghastly  weight  of  work  that  he  shrank 
from  contemplating — the  horror  he  felt  at  this 
was  really  one  of  those  things  that  must  be  en- 
dured to  be  appreciated.  But  it  was  nothing ; 
it  was  a  weak,  poor,  puerile  horror  to  that 
which  seized  his  soul  and  stultified  his  brain,  as 
the  reflection  arose  that  in  his  rash  wrath  at 
the  downfall  of  his  first  idol  he  himself  had 
marred  his  plan  of  life — had  gone  wilfully  into 
the  groove  from  which  there  was  no  escaping. 

It  was  a  soul- deadening  thought.  This 
wrong — this  bitter  wrong  which  had  been  done 
him — had  been  wrought  by  his  own  hand.  He 
had  given  way,  just  as  the  veriest  fool  might 
have  done,  to  that  feeblest  passion  which  in- 


duces a  man  to  revenge  some  injury,  real  or 
fancied,  upon  himself,  if  none  other  be  by  to 
bear  the  blow.  He  had  cast  off  those  ropes  and 
anchors  which  at  the  time  he  had  deemed  to  be 
fetters,  but  which  now  he  knew  to  have  been 
merely  saving  responsibilities.  He  had  gone  to 
perdition  at  a  slinging  trot.  He  had  taken  the 
road  from  which  there  was  no  turning  back — • 
bound,  as  he  was,  hand  and  foot — clogged,  as 
he  was,  through  his  own  folly ;  so  the  faster  he 
followed  it  the  better. 

As  his  bitter,  distorted  thoughts  reached  this 
point,  he  laid  his  head  down  upon  his  arms,  and 
groaned  in  that  bitterness  of  spirit — that  weari- 
ness of  body — that  fainting  of  the  soul— that 
doubting  of  its  God — which  parents -had  better 
strangle  their  children  in  the  cradle  than  let 
them  live  to  feel, — laid  his  head  down  and 
groaned  over  the  felly  of  that  despair  which  led 
him  to  believe  that  all  was  lost  when  a  woman 
jilted  him — that  all  was  gone  when  his  first 
scheme  for  life  was  proved  faulty. 

This  knocking  under — this  breaking  down  and 
giving  way — was  owing  much  more  to  his  piti- 
ful surroundings  than  to  the  sight  of  he)- — the 
lovely  rock  who  had  wrecked  him.  Had  he 
gone  back  to  plenty  and  peace  —to  nothing  to 
do  and  iced  wine — to  an  earnest  groom's  doubt 
of  a  blood  mare's  dam — to  a  coachman's  groan- 
ing over  the  way  the  carriage  "  was  kept  out  at 
night" — to  any  of  the  multifarious  discomforts  (!) 
of  wealth,  in  fact,  he  might  have  held  a  gloomy 
debate  in  his  soul  on  the  Bella  question,  but  he 
would  not  have  groaned,  and  found  the  cup  too 
bitter  for  hina  even  to  pray  that  it  might  pass 
away  from  him. 

Time  fleeted  on — the  shadows  lengthened  on 
the  floor,  and  did  not  decrease  in  his  heart ;  and 
at  last  he  raised  his  head  to  the  sound  of  a 
knock  at  the  door,  and  knew  that  it  was  even- 
ing. He  rose  wearily  to  answer  that  knock, 
and  struggled  to  throw  off  so  much  of  the  black- 
ness he  was  steeped  in  as  was  in  his  eyes  and  on 
his  brow.  Then  he  went  out  into  the  narrow 
passage,  and  opened  the  door,  and  tried — and 
cursed  his  own  weakness  as  he  felt  that  he 
failed — to  give  something  like  a  welcoming  smile 
to  the  childish  beauty  wistfully  glancing  at  him 
from  the  step,  and  to  the  solemn-faced  dog, 
whose  loving  wisdom  had  taught  him  to  keep 
close  to  his  master's  wife. 

You  will  have  guessed  the  secret — you  will 
have  decided  what  that  step  was  which  he  had 
taken — remembering  which,  he  felt  himself  to 
be  in  Bella's  presence  under  false  pretences. 
You  will  have  pierced  through  the  tiny  mystery 
I  have  made — you  will  have  comprehended 
that  the  baby-faced  beauty  and  Stanley  Villars 
had  cast  in  their  lots  together  "  for  better,  for 
worse." 

Even  so !  He  had  gone  there,  to  her  quiet 
little  house — to  the  doll's-house,  where  the  doll 
had  tended  him  so  unweariedly — on  that  soft 
May  evening,  meaning  to  repay  her  with  such 
measure  as  he  had  for  that  which  she  had  done 
for  him.  He  had  found  her  absent,  and  all 
things  altered.  The  peace  and  the  quiet  had 
fled,  and  in  their  place  had  come  a  doleful 
dread  of  what  was  to  follow — a  bitter  sense  of 
things  being  about  to  close  over  and  swamp  the 
butterfly-bark  that  had  put  out  to  sea  so  blithely, 
disregarding  the  idea  of  possible  squalls. 


112 


ON  GUARD. 


He  did  not  come  in  procession,  as  she  had 
prognosticated ;  nevertheless,  he  was  very  eligi- 
ble in  Rayners  eyes.  Accordingly,  that  well- 
meaning  woman  made  the  most  of  Miss  Marian's 
forlorn  state.  For  a  while  he  had  no  very  clear 
idea  of  what  he  ought  to  do  in  the  case ;  but 
eventually  it  dawned  upon  him  that  he  was 
called  upon  to  refund,  not  only  the  actual  filthy 
lucre  which  Marian  had  expended  upon  him, 
but  something  else  that  he  had  cost  her. 

He  told  himself,  sitting  there,  and  listening 
to  Rayner's  wails  about  Marian's  woes,  that  he 
had  nothing  more  to  lose,  let  him  do  what  he 
would.  He  was  cut  off  utterly;  truly,  it  was 
by  his  own  hand,  but  still  he  was  utterly  cut 
off  from  his  class  and  his  kindred.  If  this  poor 
little  girl  loved  him — if  she  had  indeed  already 
lost  something  she  could  never  regain  through 
him — why  should  he  not  «k>  all  he  could  to 
repay  and  make  her  happy  ? 

Why  not  ? 

He  asked  the  question  idly,  and  never  stayed 
to  hear  his  instincts  answer,  as  they  would  have 
done  had  he  not  rushed  along  recklessly,  bid- 
ding him  beware  of  this  worst,  last  folly  of 
linking  himself  for  the  rest  of  his  life  with  that 
for  which  his  previous  life  had  entirely  unfitted 
him.  He  was  a  man,  and  he  thought  of  her 
beauty,  and  told  himself  that  he  could  not  blight 
it,  and  that  it  behoved  him,  since  he  could  do 
so,  to  lift  the  load  that  had  come  upon  her 
through  him.  So  when  she  came  home  he 
made  her  poor  little  heart  happy,  and  let  her 
perceive  that  she  might  love  him  without  fear 
and  without  reproach.  This  was  enough  for 
her.  She  gave  no  thought  to  the  strangeness 
of  that  wooing  which  accepted  merely,  and 
offered  nothing  in  return.  He  let  her  love  him, 
but  he  neither  loved  her,  nor  lied  to  her  about 
it.  Still,  she  was  satisfied,  with  a  loving  wealth 
of  satisfaction  that  almost  refined  her  for  the 
time,  and  married  him  without  a  doubt  as  to  the 
glory  and  grandeur  of  that  fate  which  had  com- 
menced for  her  when  she  found  him  by  the 
wayside,  with  his  dog  howling  over  him. 

Not  that  he  had  deceived  her  as  to  his  posi- 
tion. At  one  fell  blow  he  had  demolished  the 
lordly  mansions  with  which  Rayner  had  en- 
dowed him,  and  had  exploded  the  King  Cophe- 
tua  and  Co.  theories.  He  tried  to  make  her 
understand  that  he  was  only  a  working  man — 
a  hard-working,  ill-paid  man.  But  she  looked 
at  his  white  hands,  and  her  ears — so  open  to 
soft,  sweet  sounds— drank  in  the  tones  of  his 
voice,  and  she  disregarded  everything  that  he 
said  to  her  in  a  cautionary  strain. 

They  were  soon  married,  and  he  removed  her 
from  the  doll's-house  to  a  lodging  in  the  heart 
of  London  that  was  more  conveniently  situated, 
in  relation  to  his  daily  haunts.  Rayner  accom- 
panied them,  nominally  as  a  servant,  in  reality 
as  Marian's  own  familiar  friend;  and  though 
Stanley  Yillars'  sense  told  him  that  this  was  a 
natural  consequence  of  former  conditions,  it 
was  a  loathsome  arrangement  to  him. 

It  must  be  admitted  that  Rayner  was  a  trial. 
She  would  take  no  wages ;  she  wept  when  he 
hinted  that  such  being  the  case,  she  had  better, 
in  justice  to  herself,  leave  them,  and  left  the 
room  in  a  prominent  manner  whenever  Mr. 
Villars  came  into  it,  in  a  way  that  made  him 
feel  himself  to  be  a  brute,  he  knew  not  why. 


Marian,  too,  had  a  habit  of  slinking  out  meekly 
after  Rayner,  evidently  with  the  design  of 
appeasing  her  aggrieved  spirit,  and  causing  her 
to  feel  that  they  were  not  loth  ungrateful. 
"When  he  remonstrated  with  Marian  for  doing 
this — he  having  wanted  her  on  one  occasion — 
Mrs.  Stanley  Yillars  proved  her  inability  to  cope 
with  circumstances,  and  adopt  a  medium  man- 
ner, by  becoming  imperious  to  her  self-sacrific- 
ing old  friend,  after  the  fashion  of  a  "  haughty 
lady,"  by  whom  she  had  been  profoundly  im- 
pressed, one  blissful  and  never-to-be-forgotten 
night  long  ago  on  the  boards  of  the  Victoria 
Theatre.  Then  Rayner  was  resigned,  and  re- 
morseful, and  reproachful  all  at  once,  in  a 
bewildering  way,  till  Stanley  Yillars  would 
have  entreated  her  to  take  the  seat  of  honour 
at  his  board  and  the  upper  chamber  in  his  man- 
sion, had  he  had  either,  rather  than  be  sub- 
jected any  longer  to  poor  Marian's  laments 
over  the  impossibility  of  her  "  keeping  Rayner 
in  her  proper  place."  At  last  things  came  to 
such  a  pass  that  he  made  another  move,  and 
told  Rayner  he  could  not  afford  such  a  luxury 
as  she  was  any  longer.  At  which  dire  decision, 
Rayner — whose  love  for  the  girl,  to  whom  she 
had  been  as  a  mother,  was  strong  and  true — 
lifted  up  her  voice  and  wept,  and  pressed  the 
savings  of  a  lifetime  upon  him  earnestly. 

Stanley  Yillars  had  realised  his  mistake  even 
while  in  the  act  of  making  it.  He  had  not 
stood  at  the  altar,  and  called  God  to  witness 
that  there  "  was  no  just  cause  or  impediment " 
to  his  marriage,  as  many  better  men  do  when 
something  whispers  them  to  the  contrary.  He 
had  not  forsworn  himself  before  God.  In  his 
own  heart  there  existed  the  impediment  which, 
while  it  did  exist,  should  have  prevented  his 
calling  any  other  woman  but  Bella  wife.  He 
knew  this,  so  he  made  their  union  binding  and 
respectable  by  wedding  Marian  Wallis  at  a 
registrar  office.  But  though  there  were  no 
words  to  stay  him  on  the  occasion,  he  fully 
realised  his  mistake  the  whole  time  he  was 
making  it. 

Perhaps  you  will  understand  more  fully  why 
he  did  so  when  you  have  seen  a  little  more  of 
Marian.  A  mere  dry  catalogue  of  his  reasons 
for  doing  so  from  my  pen  would  be  worse  than 
wasted. 

"  Where  have  you  been,  Marian  ?"  he  asked, 
as  he  opened  the  door.  He  did  not  ask  it 
sternly  or  anxiously,  as  most  husbands  would 
of  a  beautiful  young  wife.  He  merely  asked  it 
because  he  felt  that  she  expected  him  to  speak 
to  her,  that  he  ought  to  speak  to  her,  and  he 
never  knew  what  to  say. 

"  I've  been  shopping.  I  hope  you  haven't 
been  waiting  for  me  long,  Stanley,"  she  replied, 
walking  in  before  him,  and  pulling  her  bonnet 
off  as  she  preceded  him  into  the  sitting-room. 

"Not  very  long,"  he  answered,  returning  to 
his  writing,  and  taking  up  the  pen,  in  which, 
truth  to  tell,  the  ink  had  been  dry  for  more  than 
two  hours. 

"I  left  the  key  with  Mrs.  Watts,  over  the 
way,  and " 

"  Why  the  devil  did  you  ?"  he  interrupted ; 
"  when  I  found  you  were  not  at  home,  I  could 
have  gone  on  somewhere ;  besides,  if  you  were 
going  out,  you  should  have  left  the  girl  in." 

"  It  was  her  half-holiday,"  Marian  explained, 


ON  GUARD. 


113 


with  a  tremble  in  her  voice.  Though  she  was 
always  jarring  upon  his  finer  feelings,  and 
making  him  writhe,  and  feeling,  poor  thing  I 
that  she  was  doing  these  things,  this  man  was 
as  a  god  to  her — a  thing  to  love  and  tremble 
at,  to  adore  and  kneel  before. 

"  Her  half-holidays  come  devilish  quick  !"  he 
muttered ;  and  then  he  made  another  effort  to 
send  the  pen  over  the  paper,  and  found  he 
oould  not  do  it. 

"Can  I  have  something  to  eat,  Marian?"  he 
asked,  throwing  himself  back  in  his  chair,  and 
looking  at  her,  as  she  stood  smoothing  her 
ruddy,  glorious  hair  before  the  glass. 

She  stopped  her  evolutions  suddenly,  and 
glanced  round  at  him. 

"I'll  go  and  get  you  something,  Stanley. 
Haven't  you  had  any  dinner  ?" 

He  shook  his  head.  "And  I  don't  like  you  to 
get  it  for  me  in  that  nice  dress,"  he  said;  "but 
I'm  quite  knocked  up." 

She  brightened  wonderfully;  all  the  soul  of 
the  little  milliner  sparkled  up  into  her  soft  blue 
eyes,  and  irradiated  the  lovely  childish  face,  at 
his  observation  and  praise  of  her  dress. 

"  I  won't  hurt  it,  Stanley ;  I'll  light  this  fire 
and  cook  you  a  rasher,"  she  said,  with  anima- 
tion ;  but  he  had  no  appetite  for  a  rasher,  and 
she  saw  that  he  had  not,  in  his  face. 

"Never  mind.  Marian;  I'll  get  something  to 
eat  as  I  go  down  to  the  office."  Then  he  took 
out  his  watch,  and  said  he  "  must  go  presently, 
and  she  had  better  not  sit  up  for  him,  as  he 
might  be  late,  and  would  have  to  write  again 
when  he  came  home." 

She  looked  disappointed  for  a  minute  or  two ; 
it  might  be  at  the  downfall  of  the  rasher  plan ; 
it  might  be  at  the  hearing  that  she  would  not 
have  more  of  her  husband's  society  that  night. 
Whatever  it  was,  it  clouded  her  brow  only  for  a 
minute  or  two.  Then  she  brightened  up  again, 
and  resumed  her  occupation  before  the  glass, 
taking  a  delicate  violet  ribbon  from  her  pocket, 
and  passing  it  through  her  richly  tinted  hair  with 
excellent  effect. 

She  looked  so  very  young,  so  innocently 
pretty,  standing  there,  that  he  could  but  think 
of  her  tenderly  and  pityingly;  could  but  think 
of  her  as  she  was  individually,  and  not  as  a  clog 
in  relation  to  himself.  In  this  uncongenial 
union  of  theirs,  Tie  only  was  unhappy,  but  she 
was  equally  alone.  Dangerously,  pitiably 
alone ! 

"  "Where  did  you  say  you  had  been,  dear  ?" 
he  asked,  trying  to  speak  as  though  he  cared  to 
know. 

"  Shopping,"  she  replied,  blushing  a  little ; 
"  and  if  you  can  wait,  I'll  tell  you  where,  Stan- 
ley?" 

He  had  risen  and  was  looking  for  his  hat ; 
but  he  ceased  his  search  when  she  said  that, 
and  went  up  and  kissed  her,  telling  her  "  that, 
of  course,  he  could  wait."  He  pitied  her  so 
profoundly  for  being  so  utterly,  hopelessly 
powerless  as  she  was  to  efface  the  past  from  his 
memory — to  make  the  present  endurable — to 
shed  one  ray  of  warmth  into  the  heart  Bella 
Vane  had  chilled. 

"  I  went  to  the  place  where  I  used  to  work," 
she  began,  hesitatingly,  feeling  her  way,  as  it 
were. 

"  Ah,  indeed !  what  for,  dear  ?" 
8 


"Well,  I  want  a  bonnet,  you  know,  so  1 
thought  I'd  go  there  and  order  it ;  and  while  I 

was  there "     She  stopped  again,  uneasily 

twisting  her  wedding-ring  upon  her  finger,  and 
growing  full  and  flushed  in  the  face,  as  a  con- 
fused child  does.  She  was  quite  conscious  that 
she  had  gone  to  the  old  place  in  order  to  display 
herself  as  a  married  woman  and  a  gentleman's 
wife  to  her  old  companions,  and  she  half  feared 
that  he  would  fathom  the  motive  and  despise 
her,  or  be  angry. 

"And  is  this  the  new  bonnet?"  he  asked, 
laughing,  and  taking  up  the  one  she  had  pulled 
off  but  just  now. 

"  Oh,  dear,  no !  the  new  one  isn't  home  yet  ; 
but,  Stanley,  I  saw  some  one  there;" 

"  Whom  did  you  see  ?" 

"Your  sister,  Flor Miss  Yillars,"  she  an- 
swered, hastily  correcting  herself  He  had  only 
mentioned  his  sister  Florence  once,  when  she 
had  asked  him  if  he  had  any  sisters.  But  this 
brief  mention  had  been  all-sufficient  to  show 
her  that  Florence  was  a  very  sacred  thing  in 
his  estimation,  one  that  might  not  even  be 
looked  upon  lightly. 

His  brow  darkened  a  little.  "  How  did  you 
know  that  it  was  my  sister— ^lorence  ?"  he 
asked. 

" I'll  tell  you;  you  won't  be  angry?" 

"  Angry  with  you,  child !  God  forgive  me  for 
having  ever  made  you  fear  it !" 

"  I  was  in  the  show-room,  and  one  of  the 
young  ladies  who  was  great  friends  with  me 
while  I  was  there,  asked  me  to  show  off  some 
mantles  to  some  good  customers  who  were 
coming  up." 

"  You  didn't  do  it  1"  he  exclaimed. 

"  Ye— es,  I  did."  , 

"  And  it  was  Florence,"  he  almost  groaned. 
"Oh,  Marian  I  Well,  don't  mind  me,  dear; 
but  don't  do  it  again!  How  did  you  know 
her?" 

"  Miss  Simpson  (that's  my  friend,  and  I  have 
asked  her  here)  whispered  to  me  that  the  young 
lady,  the  youngest  lady,  for  they  were  both 
young,  was  Miss  Villars,  '  the  same  name  as 
the  gentleman  you've  married,'  she  said;  for 
I'd  told  her  all  about  you,  and  she  does  wish  to 
see  you  so  much,  Stanley." 

"God!"  Stanley  ejaculated. 

"  And  then  I  heard  the  other  lady  call  her 
'Florence,'  so  I  knew.  Wasn't  it  funny?  I 
wonder  what  she  would  have  thought,  if  she'd 
known." 

It  was  very  funny,  very  funny  indeed !  So 
funny,  that  Stanley  Yillars  almost  staggered 
under  the  superb  humour  of  it.  His  darling 
sister  unconsciously  accepting  humiliating  ser- 
vice from  his  wife,  and  the  shop-girls  speculat- 
ing as  to  the  similarity  of  name !  Yery  funny ! 

"Marian,"  he  said  gravely,  "you  must  not  do 
that  again ;  I'm  not  angry  with  you,  dear,  but 
I  wish  you  not  to  do  that  again ;  you  won't, 
will  you  ?" 

In  dealing  with  this  girl,  whom  he  did  not 
love,  he  never  made  use  of  the  old  authoritative 
tone  and  manner  which  had  so  chafed  Bella, 
whom  he  had  adored. 

;'No,  I  won't,"  she  said,  promptly.  "I've 
asked  Miss  Simpson — and — and — one  or  two 
of  the  others  to  come  here  to  tea  with  me,  Stan- 
ley ;  you  won't  mind  that  ?" 


1H 


ON  GUARD. 


What  could  he  say?  This  society  for  which 
she  sighed,  was  the  society  for  which  she  was 
fitted ;  and  he  saw  with  unlucky  clearness  of 
vision  that  she  would  never  be  fitted  for  any 
other.  "Not  that  it  mattered,  for  what  other 
could  she  have,  poor  little  thing!"  he  thought. 
His  own  acquaintances — the  men  with  whom  he 
was  thrown  in  daily  contact — the  men  who 
shared  and  understood  these  later  interests  of 
his — scarcely  noticed  her  at  all,  or,  if  they  did, 
plainly  regarded  her  as  a  pretty  toy,  which 
Stanley  had  been  "  weak,  rather,"  to  tie  to  him- 
self so  securely.  She  was  nice  to  look  at,  but 
a  bore  when  they  had  anything  to  do ;  for  they 
often  congregated  about  Stanley,  he  having  a 
"  local  habitation  and  a  name,"  they  were  good 
enough  to  remark ;  wrote  their  articles  at  his 
house,  and  gave  themselves  the  freedom  of  it 
generally,  in  the  frankness  of  that  good  fellow- 
ship which  would  have  redeemed  more  faults 
than  any  of  which  these  reckless,  harmless, 
clever  young  Bohemians  were  guilty.  Sad  as 
Stanley's  worldly  plight  was,  when  compared 
with  that  of  his  past  and  his  class,  it  was 
far  better  than  that  in  which  some  of  his 
brethren  of  the  craft  were  plunged.  The  days 
were  very  dark  for  some  of  them;  but  they 
were  struggling  on  through  the  darkness  with 
the  light-hearted,  plucky  determination  to  win 
their  laurels,  which  is  so  frequent  a  characteris- 
tic of  the  bright  brotherhood  to  which  they  be- 
longed. 

Stanley  Villars  felt  that  Miss  Simpson's  pre- 
sence would  not  impart  the  flavour  that  was 
already  wanting  to  make  his  wife  acceptable  to 
his  guests.  She  was  very  much  alone — more 
alone,  perhaps,  when  he  was  with  her,  than  at 
any  other  time.  He  had  no  plan  for  her  im- 
provement. He  had  no  hopes  of  amending  any- 
thing connected  with  himself.  As  she  was,  so 
he  would  leave  her.  He  had  put  such  a  clog 
round  his  neck,  that  no  amount  of  gilding  on 
the  padlock  that  secured  it  could  dazzle  the 
world  to  the  extent  of  making  it  oblivious  of 
the  crushing  weight  it  was  to  him.  *Jt  would 
crush  him  down  in  time — the  sooner  the  better ; 
meanwhile  it  was  useless  to  try  and  alter  any- 
thing that  was.  So  he  swallowed  his  repug- 
nance to  the  plan,  and  promised  Marian  the  ex- 
quisite bliss  of  seeing  her  friend  whenever  it 
seemed  good  to  her. 

Having  made  her  happy  so  far,  he  whistled 
his  dog  and  went  away  to  dinner,  if  he  could 
eat — to  work,  if  work  was  to  be  done.  It  was 
a  very  rare  thing  for  him  to  get  anything  to  eat 
in  his  own  house.  The  "girl"  was  always 
alarming  her  mistress  into  granting  her  half- 
holidays,  and  Marian  always  grew  down-hearted 
when  the  subject  of  meals  at  home  was  mooted. 
Her  share  in  the  organisation  of  the  doll's-house 
arrangements  had  obviously  been  very  small, 
he  learnt  after  Rayner's  departure. 


CHAPTER  XXXIV. 

RATHER  HARD. 

IT  may  have  occurred  to  the  reader  while 
following  this  little  history  through  the  last  few 
chapters,  that  Florence,  whom  I  described  as 


being  singularly  fond  of  and  faithful  to  her 
brother,  has  but  scantily  proved  the  justice  of 
her  claim  to  these  qualities.  Naturally,  I  who 
know  "  what  she  means"  do  not  so  misjudge 
her.  Equally  naturally  the  majority  will  feel 
that  "another  of  the  characters  has  utterly 
broken  down." 

The  fact  is,  after  that  one  visit  to  her  brother's 
lodgings — that  one  stolen  indulgence  in  the 
literary  sweets  he  was  preparing  for  the  delicate 
palate  of  that  many-headed  monster,  the  read- 
ing public — Florence  found  herself  a  sort  of 
prisoner  on  parole.  She  was  living  under  her 
brother  Gerald's  roof  at  this  time,  and  her  bro- 
ther Gerald's  wife  was,  of  course,  her  guardian 
and  supervisor.  Now  Lady  Villars  had  a  habit 
of  ill  health — scarcely  that,  but  of  most  extor- 
tionate delicacy.  She  was  always  in  a  state  of 
verbal  dread  of  being  upset.  She  went  a  "  lit- 
tle low"  on  the  smallest  provocation.  She  un- 
selfishly bewailed  these  things  on  account  of 
the  effect  they  might  have  on  her  only  child,  • 
the  little  heir.  Sir  Gerald  was  but  a  man  and 
a  baronet.  He  shrank  from  Carrie's  being  "up- 
set," for  many  reasons  that  will  be  readily  ap- 
preciated by  husbands  whose  wives  are  addicted 
to  disorganisations  of  the  sort,  and  utterly  un- 
intelligible to  the  untried  men  who  have  had 
no  such  experience.  He  shrank  from  this  as  a 
man  and  a  husband.  As  a  baronet  and  father 
he  was  more  sensitive  still,  therefore  he  cautioned 
Florence  never  to  "put  Carrie  out,"  and  Flo- 
rence promised  "not  to  do  so,"  and  forthwith 
became  a  white  slave. 

"  I  must  entreat  you  never  to  go  to  Stanley's 
lodgings  again,  without  telling  me  of  your  in- 
tention beforehand,  Florence,"  Lady  Villars  said 
to  her  sister-in-law,  shortly  after  Florry's  first 
raid  upon  Stanley's  premises. 

Florence  allowed  herself  to  be  entreated  with 
effect;  but  still,  while  acquiescing  in  the  de- 
mand made  on  her  obedience,  ventured  to  ask 
"why?" 

"I  have  my  reasons,  and  you  must  attend  to 
them,  believing  them  to  be  good,  even  though 
I  can't  explain,  dear."  Carrie's  reply  was  ac- 
companied by  a  kiss ;  so  the  affectionate  Florry 
tried  to  look  her  faith,  but  failed,  poor  child,  in 
feeling  it. 

As  time  went  on,  and  no  answer  came  to  the 
little  imploring  note  she  had  left  for  Stanley  on 
the  top  of  his  pile  of  MS.,  Florence  began  to 
feel  cut  to  the  heart,  and  doubtful  of  his  love 
for  her.  At  last  she  wrote  to  him  again— she 
had  given  Gerald  and  Carrie  no  promise  as  to 
not  writing— telling  him  unconsciously,  for  she 
was  not  given  to  complaint,  how  weary  she 
was  of  this  life  she  was  leading ;  how  willing 
to  change  it  for  one  anywhere,  anyhow,  with 
him. 

She  had  given  no  promise  as  to  not  writing, 
still  she  said  nothing  about  this  letter ;  not  out 
of  any  desire  for  secresy,  but  out  of  a  dread  of 
discussing  Stanley  and  Stanley's  doings  with 
Carrie.  Young  Lady  Villars  was  very  hard 
upon  her  brother-in-law.  It  is  difficult  to 
determine  what  feeling  it  was  that  biased  her 
judgment 'so  sternly  against  him.  "Whatever 
it  was  the  feeling  was  genuine.  She  did  feel 
him  to  be  a  very  faulty  man — a  man  whose 
sufferings  were  surpassed  by  his  sins — a  man 
who  deserved  all  he  got,  however  bad  it  might 


ON  GUARD. 


116 


be.  She  believed  that  he  must  have  been  well 
inclined  for  evil,  to  have  seized  so  sharply  upon 
the  first  excuse  for  going  into  it,  as  he  had  done. 
"  He  made  being  jilted  a  mean  excuse,"  she 
said ;  "  there  had  been  but  little  good  in  him 
ever,  or  it  would  not  have  fled  at  the  first 
wrong  note  that  was  struck  in  the  melody  of 
his  life.  Happily  the  family  honour  and  family 
name  were  not  entirely  in  his  keeping."  Then 
she  would  look  at  her  little  son,  and  feel  more 
rigorous  still  towards  Stanley  if  that  little  son 
looked  pale  or  flushed,  or  anything  unbecoming 
to  an  infant. 

These  things  that  were  said  of  her  favourite 
brother— of  that  brother  who  had  been  all  that 
a  man  should  be  till  Claude  had  played  him 
false — were  very  hard  for  Florence  to  hear. 
She  was  a  patient  girl,  and  she  gave  but  few 
signs  of  the  sorrow  that  she  felt.  But  her  soft, 
tawny  eyes — the  eyes  that  were  like  a  setter's 
in  their  tender,  loving  beauty — would  swim  in 
tears  that  she  would  not  suffer  to  fall  lest 
"  Carrie  should  be  upset,"  and  her  heart  ached 
to  be  with  Stanley  again. 

She  said  nothing  about  the  letter;  but  she 
laid  it  down  with  the  family  epistles  on  the  hall 
table  when  she  was  going  into  luncheon  one 
day.  Lady  Villars,  following  her,  stopped  her. 
and  read  the  superscription.  Florence  had  been 
desirous  only  of  evading  conversation  on  the 
subject.  She  was  careless  as  to  whether  Carrie 
saw  the  letter  or  not. 

Lady  Villars  did  not  touch  that  letter — the 
purloining  of  other  people's  correspondence  is 
not  an  attribute  of  the  English  ladies — but  she 
went  hastily  back  into  the  drawing-room,  where 
she  had  left  her  husband  sitting  by  the  fire.  It 
was  a  cold  April  day — one  of  the  days  poor 
Stanley  was  passing  in  dreamy  doubt  in  the 
doll's-house ;  it  might,  therefore,  be  the  cold 
which  imparted  an  extra  glitter  to  Lady  Villars' 
eyes,  and  a  heightened  flush  to  her  round,  fair 
cheek. 

"Gerald,"  she  began,  hurriedly,  "here's  Flo- 
rence writing  again  to  Stanley  1  You  must 


;What  shall  I  say?  Oh,  let  her!"  he  re- 
plied, in  a  vexed  tone. 

"  Say !  you  must  know  what  to  say.  It's  for 
Florence's  good  I'm  anxious,  You  might  give 
me  credit  for  that."  She  sat  herself  down  as 
she  spoke,  and  looked  as  though  she  were  going 
to  be  upset. 

"So  I  do,  dear,"  he  replied,  getting  up  and 
standing  before  the  fire,  and  making  a  feeble 
effort  to  twist  his  moustache  unconcernedly. 
"  It's  a  difficult  matter  to  interfere  in.  Dear  old 
Stanley !  I  wish  to  God  he'd  come  back  and 
be  with  us  again!" 

"So  do  I,  if  he  did  but  see  the  error  of  his 
ways.  But  to  throw  up  his  profession  in  that 
wicked  way,  and  go  off'  and  lead  a  godless  life 
as  he  is  doing;  I  cannot  think  of  him  affec- 
tionately." 

"A  godless  life!  Come,  Carrie,  that's  rather 
strong,  you  know." 

u  At  all  events,  the  life  he  leads  is  not  the  life 
you,  as  her  guardian,  ought  to  suffer  that  child 
Florence  to  know  anything  about." 

Gerald  made  a  faint  protest :  "  "Writing  to  her 
brother  can't  harm  her." 

"Writing!    yes,  as  if  it  would  end  there. 


Florence  has  a  tinge  of  romance  about  her ;  and 
if  it  gets  inflamed,  where  are  her  prospects? 
Being  spoken  about  with  Claude  Walsingham 
(another  of  Stanley's  precious  friends)  did  her 
no  good.  You  must  be  careful  of  Florence, 
Gerald." 

"So  I  will." 

"Ay,  but  very  careful.  Florence  is  a  little 
unhappy  about  that  Claude  still ;  and  more  than 
a  little  inclined  to  believe  Stanley  a  noble  mar- 
tyr. Really  the  responsibility  will  be  too  much 
for  me,  if  you  won't  assist  me." 

"  What  shall  I  do,  Carrie?  Play  the  tyrant, 
and  forbid  her  writing  to  her  brother  and  mine, 
because  he's  gone  to  the  devil  for  a  time  about 
a  woman?  No,  no!" 

Lady  Villars  rose  and  went  nearer  to  him, 
sinking  her  voice  to  a  whisper  nearly,  but  speak- 
ing energetically.  "I  tell  you,  Gerald,  you 
must.  He  has  formed  a  low  connection." 

"  Whew  1  How  do  you  know  ?"  he  asked, 
quickly. 

"  Pollock"  (mentioning  her  maid)  "heard  of 
it  in  the  show-room  at  Mrs.  Mitchell's  the  other 
day.  It's  one  of  her  girls.  Now  fancy,  Gerald!" 

Carrie  clasped  her  hands,  and  stretched  them 
down  before  her  as  she  spoke.  She  was  one  of 
those  pinky-faced  women,  with  short  noses, 
who  always  look  simple  and  well-meaning, 
whether  they  be  so  or  not.  '  The  attitude 
matched  the  face;  it  was  innocent  and  ap- 
pealing. 

"  I  can't  fancy  it,"  he  replied.  He  could  have 
believed  any  amount  of  downright  depravity  of 
Stanley  just  then,  because  he  felt  certain  that 
Stanley's  frame  of  mind  was  very  sore  and  reck- 
less. But  a  liaison  with  a  milliner's  girl !  He 
did  his  brother  the  justice  of  disbelieving  it. 
He  could  not  accredit  Stanley  with  being  guilty 
of  such  a  fatal  folly. 

"But  I  know  it,  Gerald."  How  convincing 
Lady  Villars'  tones  were  when  she  wanted  to 
convince.  "I  know  it.  Pollock  will  talk,  you 
know " 

"  Why  the  devil  about  my  brother  ?"  Gerald 
interrogated  hastily.  But  Carrie  went  on — 

"  She  will  talk ;  and  when  I  found  that  she 
had  something  to  say  I  listened — something 
concerning  Stanley,  I  mean." 

"  Deuced  insolent  of  her  !" 

"  Well,  I  confess  I  asked  her,  Gerald.  She's 
very  right-thinking,  and  knows  her  place,  and  is 
thoroughly  attached  to  the  family;  therefore 
when  I  found  she  knew  something  about  Stan- 
ley, I  did  ask  her.  The  girl  is  to  be  dis- 
missed." 

"  Were  there  any  truth  in  it  she'd  have  dis- 
missed herself.  But  let  us  go  in  to  luncheon ; 
Florry  will  be  wondering,  as  well  she  may,  why 
we  stay." 

Accordingly  they  went  in  to  luncheon,  and 
after  it  Gerald  took  occasion  to  tell  Florry  that 
"  Carrie  was  very  anxious  about  her — very 
much  feared  she  was  not  happy,  and— and — all 
that  sort  of  thing." 

"Not  exactly  unhappy,  Gerald." 

"  Well,  a  good  imitation  of  it,  dear — pining 
after  Stanley,  we're  afraid." 

"  And  isn't  that  natural  ?" 

She  went  up  close  to  him  as  she  asked  it. 
She  put  both  her  hands  on  his  shoulders,  and 
bent  her  head  down  on  his  chest,  then  lifted  it 


116 


OX  GUARD. 


again  suddenly,  and  looked  into  his  face  with 
her  soft,  loving  eyes. 

"  And  isn't  that  natural?  ?" 

It  nearly  upset  his  resolution.  The  fraternal 
element  is  very  strong  amongst  us  English,  try 
to  hide  it  as  we  may.  But  he  remembered  his 
wife,  and  his  heir.  Carrie  had  told  him  that  did 
he  not  assist  her,  "her  responsibilities  in  this 
matter  of  Florence  would  be  too  much  for 
her." 

"  "Well,  it  is  natural,  my  darling  sister.  Poor 
little  Florence,  don't  cry ;  it  will  all  be  well  in 
time,  dear.  Meanwhile  it's  better  both  for 
Stanley  and  for  you  that  you  shouldn't  try  to 
mix  yourself  up  with  him — indeed  it  is." 

"  I  don't— believe — it,"  Florence  sobbed. 

"  My  dear  Florry,  it  is— believe  me."  Then 
he  began  to  feel  weak  of  purpose  before  the 
strength  of  her  love  for  that  absent  brother  of 
whom  they  had  hoped  such  bright  things  in 
his  youth,  and  he  struck  an  unfair  blow. 

"  Doesn't  Stanley  tell  you  so  himself  by  his 
silence  ?" 

"  No-o." 

"  Now,  you're  blind,  Florry,"  he  said  gravely. 
"  Had  he  thought  it  wise  or  well  for  you  to  see 
him,  wouldn't  he  have  acknowledged  your 
visit  and  your  note  ?" 

Florence  lifted  her  hands  and  her  head  away 
from  him ;  but  she  was  only  stung,  not  con- 
quered yet. 

"  Perhaps  not.  I  know  Stanley  so  well, 
Gerald :  he'd  never  be  the  one  to  come  half- 
way to  meet  any  one  who  didn't  seem  to  want 
him  very  much." 

"  You  have  seemed  to  want  him  very  much, 
and  he  hasn't  come." 

" DorUt—  don't  make  me  doubt  Stanley!"  she 
cried,  bursting  out  into  a  passion  o/  tears  that 
made  Sir  Gerald  pity  her,  and  himself,  pro- 
foundly. 

"  I  don't  want  to  make  you  doubt  him,  dear ! 
There,  there,  say  no  more  about  it !  By  Jove ! 
what  is  a  fellow  to  do  ?  Florry,  do  be  reason- 
able!" 

She  heaved  and  sighed  in  answer  to  this  ad- 
juration, but  did  not  sob  any  more. 

"  It's  so  awkward  to  explain,"  he  muttered. 
"The  long  and  the  short  of  it  is,  Florry,  that 
you'd  better  not  send  that  letter  you've  written 
to  Stanley.  Don't  look  at  me  as  if  I  were  your 
jailer.  I'd  better  out  with  it,  I  suppose !  "  he 
continued,  confusedly.  "Stanley's  not  leading 
the  sort  of  life  you  ought  to  countenance. 
There,  I've  done  it  now."  He  almost  groaned 
as  Florence  turned  away  and  sat  down,  looking 
very  pale  and  terribly  shocked,  but  speaking 
not  a  word. 

"  I'll  send  Carrie  to  you,  dear,"  he  said  hasti- 
ly, kissing  her  brow.  "  Don't  think  about  it : 
we'll  have  him  back  all  right  by-and-by.  Mean- 
time dont  upset  Carrie — there's  a  darling 
girl!" 

"No,  Gerald,  no;  I  won't." 

"  Shall  I  send  her  to  you— and  the  boy  ?»  he 
asked  cheerily,  walking  to  the  door.  u  The 
boy,"  in  his  opinion,  was  an  infallible  panacea 
for  every  ailment,  mental  or  bodily,  that  could 
assail  humanity.  He  himself  had  found  much 
comfort  in  perusing  those  infant  lineaments  at 
divers  times.  He  offered  him  to  Florence  now 
as  a  perfect  cure,  and  was  rather  astonished  she 


didn't  bound  in  spirit  towards  the  acceptance 
of  it. 

He  was  very  glad  to  get  himself  away  out  of 
his  sister's  presence.  He  felt  that  he  had  de- 
nied it  by  aspersing  Stanley  to  her — Stanley, 
with  whom  she  had  ever  been  so  much  more 
intimate — Stanley,  who  had  always  been  so 
much  "  better  a  fellow "  than  himself.  Sir 
Gerald  had  never  made  Florence  his  friend  and 
confidante  in  his  boyish  scrapes,  and  in  the  di- 
lemmas of  his  riper  years.  To  touch  upon  this 
topic  for  the  first  time  with  her  in  relation  to 
Stanley  made  him  feel  very  unhappy,  and 
ashamed  of  himself. 

Shortly  Lady  Yillars  came  to  her,  offering 
her  restoratives,  and  counselling  warmth  as 
though  the  chill  she  had  received  had  been 
bodily.  And  Lady  Yillars  enlarged  upon  the 
theme  which  her  husband  had  merely  broached, 
till  Florence  of  the  yielding  spirit  felt  that  Stan- 
ley was  a  being  bad  and  dangerous  to  know — 
a  thing  to  dearly  love, 'and  shrink  from. 

She  gave  up  the  letter,  and  saw  it  deftly  rent 
into  narrow  strips,  and  then  curled  into  match- 
es between  her  sister-in-law's  plump  fingers, 
and  she  had  to  subdue  her  own  sentiments  at 
the  sight,  for  Carrie  was  quite  ready  to  be  agi- 
tated and  upset.  In  fact,  she  put  herself  under 
Lady  Yillars'  plump  little  white  thumb  that 
day,  and  remained  there  while  Lady  Yillars 
saturated  her  with  wise  saws  and  modern  in- 
stances. 

In  the  nursery  in  the  evening  Lady  Yillars 
had  it  all  her  own  way  with  Florence  more 
completely  still.  They  sat  by  the  fire,  and 
passed  little  Gerald  backwards  and  forwards 
from  lap  to  lap  till  that  unconscious  little  inno- 
cent had  set  the  ball  of  good  feeling  and  con- 
versation rolling  smoothly  between  them.  Then 
Lady  Yillars  mooted  the  matter  again,  and  im- 
parted additional  poignancy  to  it  by  introducing 
Claude  Walsingham's  name,  till  Florence,  be- 
tween her  agony  of  dread  lest  the  nursemaids 
should  hear,  and  her  agony  of  shame  of  what 
she  had  deemed  the  secret  of  her  heart  being 
known  at  all,  was  ready  to  promise  anything. 

"It  is  kinder  in  reality  to  keep  entirely  apart 
from  Stanley  now,  Florry :  indeed  it  is.  He's 
more  likely  to  stop  on  his  road  to  ruin  than  if 
we  countenanced  him  as  though  he  were  doing 
something  very  fine." 

"  I  hope  it  may  prove  kindness,  .but  it's  harsh 
kindness." 

"I  little  thought  that  I  should  ever  have 
been  accused  of  unjust  cruelty  by  one  member 
of  Gerald's  family  in  relation  to  another!"  Lady 
Yillars  said,  with  touching  resignation. 

"  I  don't  mean  to  accuse  you,  Carrie ;  indeed 
I  don't !"  Florence  answered  in  an  agony  of 
dread.  Lady  Yillars  had  an  alarming  power  of 
going  pale  and  contracting  her  nostrils,  and 
these  were  usually  held  to  be  preliminaries  to 
her  being  upset. 

"  It's  uncommonly  like  accusing  me,  and  it 
does  hurt  me  when  it  is  only  your  interest  that 
I  have  at  heart.  Gerald  and  I  are  in  such  a 
position  that  we  might  venture  to  do  anything 
of  the  sort ;  but  for  you  to  appear  to  be  vindi- 
cating Stanley  now,  when  he's " 

Florence  made  a  deprecating  gesture  with 
her  hands ;  but  Lady  Yillars  only  paused  for  an 
instant,  and  then  resumed — 


ON  GUARD. 


117 


"  Well,  it  would  be  simply  wrong  on  our 
part  to  see  you  doing  it  and  not  to  warn  you  ; 
unjust  to  you  and  unkind  to  Stanley.  He's  far 
more  likely  to  leave  off  evil  doing  if  he  finds 
that  it  cuts  him  off  from  us,  than  if  we  took  no 
notice ;  to  seek  him  would  be  to  encourage  him, 
and,  if  your  love  for  Stanley  is  genuine,  you 
won't  do  it." 

If  her  love  for  Stanley  were  genuine! 
Florence  made  no  answer  in  words,  but  she 
glanced,  with  a  piteous  reproach  in  her  eyes,  at 
her  sister-in-law — a  reproach  that  was  so  elo- 
quent that  even  Lady  Villars  was  touched  by 
it.  "  Even  Lady  Villars,"  do  I  say ;  this  im- 
plies a  doubt  of  Lady  Villars'  integrity  of  pur- 
pose in  this  business,  which  I  am  far  from  feel- 
ing. The  motives  which  influenced  her  were 
honest  enough,  only  she  was  rather  hard. 

"  There,  Florry,  I  didn't  mean  to  say  that 
quite.  I  know  how  genuine  your  love  for  Stan- 
ley is — therefore  I  feel  sure  that  you  will  not 
refuse  to  put  a.  little  temporary  restraint  on 
your  feelings,  for  his  ultimate  good." 

"  Ultimate  good  !  "  The  phrase  was  a  nice, 
magnanimous,  well-sounding  one.  Florence 
was  rather  impressed  by  it  on  the  whole.  Of 
course  she  was  quite  ready  to  do  anything  that 
might  conduce  to  Stanley's  ultimate  good. 

So  she  was  induced,  through  her  love  for  him, 
to  give  up  seeking  for  a  renewal  of  intercourse 
with  the  brother  who  was  under  a  cloud.  So 
she  was  influenced  to  fall  away  from  him  out- 
wardly for  his  ultimate  good. 

Some  few  days  after  this,  Lady  Villars  told 
her,  with  a  very  well  conceived  casual  air,  that 
"the  Walsinghams  were  in  town!  didn't  she 
think  it  would  be  well  to  call  ?" 

"  No ;  I  don't,"  Florence  replied,  nervously. 

"  Why  not?  it  would  look  better." 

"I  couldn't  go!"  Florence  said,  imploringly. 

"  My  dear  child,  surely  you  are  not  going  to 
bear  malice  against  Bella  all  your  life  because 
she  discovered,  happily  before  it  was  too  late 
(Lady  Villars  said  this  with  virtuous  fervour), 
that  she  did  not  love  your  brother  ?  " 

Florence  made  no  answer.  She  was  very 
truthful,  and  she  knew  that  Bella's  making  this 
discovery  had  not  been  the  worst  offence  to- 
wards herself.  Lady  Villars  had  some  notion 
of  this  kind  also ;  but  she  judged  it  better  to 
ignore  what  would  not  be  altered  by  mention. 

"Oh!  I'm  sure  you  would  not  do  that, 
\Florry ;  I'm  not  Stanley:s  own  sister,  but  I  be- 
lieve I  know  him  well  enough  to  be  sure  that 
he  would  not  wish  such  a  display  of  petty  feel- 
ing. Of  course  you  will  go  with  me  to  call  on 
her?" 

"Why  must  I  go,  Carrie?" 

"It  would  look  pointed  if  you  didn't;  be- 
sides," Lady  Villarrs  went  on,  looking  straight 
between  Florence's  eyes  as  she  spoke,  "people 
might  make  mistakes,  and  attribute  your  re- 
maining away  to  a  cause  that  you  wouldn't  care 
to  have  it  attributed  to.  From  every  point  of 
view" — (Lady  Villars,  in  common  with  the  rest 
of  the  world,  merely  meant  her  own,  when  she 
said  this) — "from  every  point  of  view  such  a 
course  would  be  unwise — unwise  to  the  last 
degree." 

Once  more  Florence  permitted  herself  to  be 
convinced ;  but  she  felt  it  to  be  rather  hard  that 
'she  should  be  put  to  the  test  in  this  way  with- 


out an  end  or  aim,  as  it  seemed.  Meek  and 
gentle,  timid  and  soft  as  \she  was,  she  had  that 
in  her  which  would  have  carried  her  over  hot 
ploughshares  without  shrinking,  had  the  doing 
so  been  essential  to  the  well-being  of  the  one 
she  loved.  But  her  heart  fainted  within  her  at 
being  thus  called  upon  to  perform  a  painful  task, 
in  order  that  people  to  whom  she  was  indiffer- 
ent might  not  attribute  her  letting  said  task 
alone  to  some  bygone  cause,  in  which,  at  least, 
there  was  no  shame. 

However,  Lady  Villars  had  set  her  heart  on 
Florence  going  to  call  on  Mrs.  Claude  Walsing- 
ham.  Need  it  be  said,  after  this  statement,  that 
Florence  went. 

On  the  whole,  Mrs.  Claude  would  far  rather 
that  they  had  not  extended  the  olive  branch  in 
person  just  yet.  She  was  much  disturbed  at 
the  sight  of  them,  and  desperately  uncertain  as 
to  what  it  would  be  well  to  talk  about.  With 
Lady  Villars  alone  she  would  have  been  at  her 
ease,  for  Lady  Villars  was  great  at  forgiving 
other  people's  injuries.  But  with  Florence  she 
could  not  be  at  ease  for  several  reasons.  Flo- 
rence had  been  down  at  Denham  during  the 
•  days  of  doubt  and  of  struggling.  Florence  had 
at  one  time  held  her  own  Claude's  fickle  fancy 
— had  dearly  loved  him,  and  been  wofully  de- 
ceived by  them  both.  With  her  usual  pleasant 
power  of  putting  away  unpleasant  thoughts,  Mrs. 
Claude  had  thrown  these  facts  off  her  mind 
while  Florence  was  neither  seen  by  nor  men- 
tioned to  her.  But  now,  that  Florence  was 
before  her  in  the  flesh — and,  alas !  in  less  of  it 
than  of  yore — Bella  remembered  vividly,  and 
felt  penitent  and  uncomfortable. 

It  was  difficult  to  know  what  to  speak  about. 
Everything  of  which  she  could  think  had  some 
relation — even  if  remote — to  the  subject  which, 
she  was  morally  certain,  was  occupying  the 
thoughts  of  all.  She  wronged  Lady  Villars 
there,  though !  Carrie  was  thinking  only  of  a 
pair  of  Venetian  glasses,  in  antique  silver 
frames,  and  wondering  where  Claude  had  got 
them. 

The  same  difficulty  was  oppressing  Florence 
with  tenfold  force.  Say  what  she  would,  it  was 
safe  to  refer  to  Claude,  it  seemed  to  her.  In 
addition,  too,  the  dread  was  upon  her  ol 
Claude's  coming  in  suddenly  and  finding  them 
there.  She  began  to  wonder  how  he  would 
look  if  he  did  come  in,  and  what  he  would  say, 
and  what  he  would  think?  These  conjectures 
caused  her  to  miss  the  thread  of  a  poor  little 
conversation  that  had  been  gallantly  started — a 
conversation  about  dogs — not  living  dogs — but 
dogs  of  Dresden. 

"Have  you  got  Rock  still?"  she  asked, 
thinking  that  by  thus  asking  she  was  proving 
that  she  had  taken  an  interest  in  and  followed 
the  subject. 

Bella  blushed  a  little,  and  one  hand  that  was 
lying  upon  a  table  gave  a  convulsive  twitch. 

"No;  I  gave  him  to  your  brother,  Stanle}-," 
she  said,  in  a  low  tone,  "  when  I  married." 

"How  is  Major  Walsingham ?"  Lady  Villars 
asked,  quite  cheerfully.  And  then  Bella  told 
them  of  the  accident  which  had  befallen  him  in 
the  hunting  field,  and  tried  not  to  seem  to  see 
the  tears  that  gathered  in  Florence's  eyes  as  she 
listened.  Mrs.  Claude  addressed  herself  to 
Lady  Villars,  as  she  told  the  story ;  but  when 


118 


ON  GUARD. 


she  had  finished  it,  there  was  a  touch  of  true 
womanly  feeling  in  the  way  she  turned  to  Flo- 
rence, and  said,  as  one  sure  of  sympathy,  "  I 
thought  I  should  have  lost  my  husband  then!" 

And  that  the  sympathy  she  had  sought  was 
given,  no  one  could  doubt  who  saw  Florence's 
face. 

"Ah!"  Lady  Yillars  broke  in  adroitly,  com- 
ing to  the  rescue  with  a  bit  of  practicality  that 
was  invaluable  at  the  moment.  "Ah!  I  re- 
member, Gerald  was  pitched  into  a  ditch  half 
full  of  water  once,  and  we  agreed  then  that  in 
every  field  there  ought  to  be  a  surgeon  and  a 
stomach-pump." 

"  They  should  be  attached  to  the  kennel,  in 
fact,"  Bella  said,  laughing;  and  then  the  visit 
came  to  an  end. 


CHAPTER  XXXY. 

A   STAB   IN   THE   DARK. 

MRS.  MARKHAM  brought  her  visit  to  a  close 
almost  immediately  after  that  call  Stanley  Vil- 
lars  had  designed  so  well,  and  executed  so 
badly.  She  went  back  to  a  home  that  wanted 
her — to  a  husband  that  welcomed  her — to  du- 
ties that  she  performed  with  a  flawless  exacti- 
tude that  may  not  be  excelled ;  and  when  she 
was  gone,  Bella  raised  her  arms  over  her  head, 
and  clasped  her  hands  together,  with  a  child's 
action  of  relief  when  its  period  of  behaving 
with  circumspection  is  over  for  a  term. 

Mrs.  Claude  breathed  more  freely  when  her 
sister-in-law  left.  She  had  never  taken  things 
easily — never  gone  her  own  way,  and  suffered 
her  guest  to  do  the  like — as  she  would  have 
done  with  any  other  relation  or  intimate  friend. 
From  first  to  last  she  had  treated  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  with  marked  consideration ;  and  the  doing 
so  had  only  been  one  degree  more  laborious  to 
her  than  to  Mrs.  Markham. 

Mrs.  Markham  had  quickly  detected  this  re- 
solve of  Bella's  to  be  on  guard  against  anything 
like  careless  intimacy  with  her,  and  to  treat 
her  with  such  grave,  unremitting  attention  as 
should  be  shown  by  a  well-bred  hostess  to  a 
distinguished  but  not  specially  dear  denizen  of 
her  house.  There  was  nothing  absolutely  sus- 
picious on  the  face  of  it  in  this.  Nevertheless 
Mrs.  Markham,  failing  to  account  for  it  in  the 
right  way,  namely,  by  comprehending  the  sim- 
ple truth,  which  was  that  Bella  didn't  like  her, 
imagined  that  Bella  feared  her — consequently 
had  cause  for  it. 

But  it  was  in  vain  she  watched  for  a  cause 
which  should  appear  sufficiently  strong,  even 
to  her  .prejudiced  mind,  to  account  for  such 
fear.  She  watched  and  waited  with  a  patient 
assiduity  that  almost  ennobled  her  task,  being 
truly  zealous  in  the  good  work  of  detecting 
something  that  might  make  her  brother  misera- 
ble for  life. 

However,  she  watched  and  waited  in  vain. 
It  might  be  a  folly,  but  it  could  hardly  be 
termed  a  crime,  that  Bella  should  have  written 
to  Stanley  Villars  without  her  husband's  know- 
ledge. It  was  a  misdirected  literary  taste 
which  led  her  to  peruse  that  same  gentleman's 
works  of  fiction;  but  not  a  convincing  proof 


of  unholy  affection  for  said  gentleman.  Even 
Mrs.  Markham  was  obliged  to  admit  these 
things,  and  that  she  -had  watched  and  waited 
in  vain. 

Friendship  also  made  her  warmly  welcome 
on  her  return  to  her  own  sphere.  Grace 
Harper  was  unfeignedly  rejoiced  to  see  her, 
and  really  made  her  feel  that  her  stony  society 
was  a  thing  to  be  sought ;  and  Grace  was  an 
attentive  listener  to  all  that  had  transpired  in 
Major  Walsingham's  house,  and  to  all  that 
had  not  transpired  about  Major  Walsingham's 
wife. 

"  I  am  only  sure  of  one  thing,  and  that  is, 
that  it  would  have  been  a  happy  thing  for  my 
brother  if  he  had  never  seen  her,"  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  said,  with  a  sort  of  solemn  satisfaction  in 
being  able  to  fall  back  upon  a  strong  sentiment 
that  shall  not  be  shaken,  that  is  frequently 
adopted  when  facts  fail. 

Grace  Harper  looked  up  stolidly.  In  reality 
she  was  more  excited  on  this  subject  than  on 
any  other  that  had  ever  been  brought  under 
her  notice;  for  Claude  Walsingham  was  hale 
and  handsome,  powerful  and  passionate  again 
now.  She  looked  up  stolidly,  and  said — 

"Even  now,  if  anything  were  found  out, 
they  might  be  separated,  mightn't  they  ?" 

Eager  as  Mrs.  Markham  had  been  to  find 
Bella  unworthy  in  ever  so  small  degree — pati- 
ently as  she  had  watched  and  waited  for  some- 
thing wrong — the  result  of  such  finding  and 
waiting  had  never  shaped  itself  clearly  in  her 
mind  before.  The  blood  came  up  into  her  face, 
and  she  looked  less  hard  than  usual,  as  she  ask- 
ed— 

"Do  you  mean  divorced?" 

"They  would  be,  I  suppose,  if  anything " 

Grace  was  commencing  phlegmatically,  when 
Mrs.  Markham  burst  in  with — 

"Pray  God  there  may  never  be  found  a 
cause  for  it !  Pray  God  such  disgrace  may  be 
averted  from  my  brother  and  our  name !  How 
could  you,  Grace  ?  how  could  you  say  it  ?" 

Miss  Grace  offering  no  explanation,  Mrs. 
Markham  went  on — 

"  What  right  have  you  to  judge  her  in  that 
way — to  suspect  her,  and  think,  because  she 
has  been  a  nighty  girl,  that  there  is  any  tiling 

"  She  stopped,  choked  by  her  anger  and 

pride ;  and  then  Grace  spoke. 

"  I  only  drew  deductions  from  what  you  said 
yourself,  and  from  those  reports  one  can't  take 
hold  of  and  examine,  about  her  way  of  going 
on  when  she  was  Miss  Vane.  I  should  be  as 
shocked  as  you  could  be,  Ellen,  at  anything  be- 
falling Claude." 

In  spite  of  this  assertion  of  hers,  Miss  Har- 
per's mind  dwelt  much  on  the  subject  of  a  sepa- 
ration .between  Major  "Walsingham  and  his  wife. 
She  found  herself  planning  out  a  future  for  him, 
did  such  a  thing  occur,  as  she  drove  home  after 
that  visit  to  Mrs.  Markham.  In  time  his  father 
would  die.  Her  father  had  said  but  yesterday 
that  "  Walsingham,  who  appeared  so  well  pre- 
served, would  probably  break  down  suddenly, 
and  go  off,  very  much  to  the  surprise  of  those 
who  regarded  him  as  looking  so  wonderfully 
well  for  his  years."  And  when  he  died,  Claude, 
his  son,  would  reign  in  his  stead. 

Why,  it  might  be  very  soon ;  and  he  might — 
would  probably — settle  at  the  Court,  and  take 


ON  GUARD. 


119 


his  place  in  the  county.  The  Court  would  be  a 
good  place  to  come  to  in  order  to  get  over  the 
loss  of  his  wife. 

"The  loss  of  his  wife!  "  She  started,  stolid 
as  she  was,  as  the  words  formed  themselves, 
and  she  thought  them  out.  Then  she  comfort- 
ed herself,  telling  herself  that  she  was  not  wish- 
ing evil  to  Bella :  separation,  a  divorce,  might 
ensue  from  other  causes  than  Bella  being 
proved  guilty. 

Her  brain  was  very  busy  during  the  rest  of 
the  journey.  She  saw  herself  mutely  consoling 
a  man  who  had  been  wronged  by  others,  anc 
in  time  rewarded  by  that  man.  Her  brain  was 
very  busy,  even  when  she  reached  home,  anc 
retailed  to  her  father  and  mother  during  dinner 
the  light,  idle  gossip  of  the  uneventful  day. 

About  a  week  after  Mrs.  Markham's  de 
parture,  Claude  and  Bella  had  arranged  to  go 
out  for  a  ride  together,  an  unusual  thing  in 
those  days,  and  one,  therefore,  for  which  Bella 
prepared  herself  in  good  time,  in  order  tha 
Claude  might  not  be  put  to  the  trying  test  of 
waiting  for  her.  The  consequence  of  this  pre- 
caution was  that  she  was  ready  long  before  it 
had  come  to  him  to  think  about  preparing  to  go 
out  with  her.  Therefore,  being  in  her  habit, 
she  had  nothing  for  it  but  to  hang  about  be- 
tween the  rooms,  and  while  away  the  time, 
while  he  kept  her  waiting. 

She  walked  well  and  freely  in  her  habit. 
The  clinging  cloth  makes  no  manner  of  differ- 
ence to  the  gait  of  the  woman  accustomed  to 
it.  She  takes  longer  steps  than  are  hers  ordi- 
narily, that  is  all.  So  it  came  about  that  she 
beguiled  the  tiresome  time  by  moving  about 
and  altering  the  position  of  a  few  of  her  favour- 
ite ornaments,  with*whose  place  in  the  world 
she  was  never  quite  satisfied,  as  was  natural. 
"What  woman  is  ever  quite  satisfied  that  the 
situation  of  the  thing  dear  to  her  is  not  to  be  im- 
proved upon  ?  She  walked  about  the  drawing- 
room,  therefore,  happily  enough  for  a  while — as 
happily,  that  is,  as  any  woman  can  walk  about 
and  waste  the  time,  when  she  knows  that  her 
horse  is  awaiting  her  outside  the  door,  and  that 
the  flies  are  teasing  him,  and  making  him  im- 
patient to  be  off. 

At  last  she  had  moved  all  she  could  move  in 
the  room  with  effect.  She  had  put  the  Venus 
de'  Medici  on  a  broad  crimson-backed  bracket, 
and  the  life-size  Clytie  on  a  pedestal,  and  the 
Venus  of  Milo  on  a  stand,  where  the  glorious 
figure  looked  "not  out  of  place" — she  never 
can  look  that ;  but  sorry  for  the  world  that  had 
no  better  place  to  offer  her ;  grandly  compassion- 
ate to  its  bad  taste ;  loyally  resigned  to  a  false 
position. 

When  she  had  achieved  these  ends  Bella 
grew  petulant.  "Claude  might  have  remem- 
bered !"  she  muttered  to  herself.  "  Poor  Devil- 
skin  I  a  sweet  temper  he'll  be  in  when  we  do 
start,  after  waiting  so  long!" 

She  passed  before  a  glass  in  order  to  tip  her 
hat  a  bit  more  forward  over  her  brow,  and  see 
if  the  stand-up  collar  set  well.  Then  she  pick- 
ed up  her  gloves  and  whip,  and  walked  with 
that  long,  sliding  step  so  suitable  to  a  habit,  out 
of  the  room,  and  down  into  the  hall,  to  be 
ready  there  "when  Claude  came." 

The  twelve  o'clock  postman  knocked  as  she 
set  her  foot  on  the  last  stair,  and  she  watched 


proceedings  lazily,  as  the  man  who  was  wait- 
ing to  let  Claude  and  herself  out  took  the  let- 
ters in,  and  placed  them  on  a  salver  on  the  hall 
table.  It  was  a  practice  of  hers  never  to  open 
a  letter  in  the  middle  of  the  day.  The  morning 
and  evening  were  all-sufficient  for  such  toil. 
Experience  had  taught  her  that  a  letter  lost 
nothing  by  waiting,  and  that  answers  to  effu- 
sions which  came  in  haste  at  mid-day  might 
always  be  deferred  with  safety. 

However,  she  had  nothing  better — z'.e.,  plea- 
santer — to  do  now  than  to  see  what  that  post 
had  brought  her.  -  So  she  walked  idly  up  to 
the  table,  and  commenced  burrowing  with  her 
doe-skin  covered  hand  (she  always  rode  in  doe- 
skin gloves,  the  reins  did  not  slip  through  them) 
amongst  the  packet  of  letters  that  had  just 
arrived.  There  were  a  lot  for  her  husband. 
These  she  passed  over,  merely  looking  at  his 
name  without  a  second  glance.  She  was  a 
very  faulty  woman,  this  Bella;  apt  to  forget 
what  she  ought  to  have  remembered,  and  to 
remember  what  she  ought  to  have  forgotten. 
But  she  had  no  low  curiosity.  It  was  one  of 
the  articles  in  her  erring  creed  of  faith,  that  if 
her  husband  desired  her  to  see  a  thing  he  would 
show  it  to  her.  If  not,  she  would  not  seek  for 
it.  So  now  she  tossed  these  letters  of  his  over 
with  a  careless  hand,  and  searched  for  any  stray 
ones  that  might  have  arrived  for  herself  just  to 
beguile  the  time. 

Suddenly  she  came  upon  one  in  a  long,  nar 
row,  cream-laid  envelope,  which,  she  turned 
over  leisurely,  thinking  that  the  seal  or  stamped 
monogram  would  tell  from  whom  it  came,  and 
so  save  her  the  trouble  of  reading  it.  There 
was  no  stamped  monogram,  however,  and  the 
seal  was  one  of  those  puerile  conceits  which 
belong  to  nobody  in  particular.  With  one  lit- 
tle, impatient  glance. at  the  stairs,  down  which 
Claude  came  not,  she  broke  that  seal  away  and 
read. 

Such  a  letter !  No  civil  invitation ;  no  false 
form  of  inquiry;  no  friendly  platitudes;  no 
tradesman's  puff!  Any  or  all  of  these  she 
would  have  counted  tedious  ten  minutes  be- 
fore. Any  or  all  of  these  would  have  been 
wildly  welcomed  by  her  in  place  of  this  mise- 
rable epistle  which  she  held  in  her  hand. 

It  commenced,  "  My  dear  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham ;"  and  seeing  this  friendly  commencement 
Bella  was  led  on  into  the  weakness  of  reading 
it  before  looking  at  the  signature.  Reading  a 
portion  of  it — that  is,  an  all-sufficient  porRn, 
since  it  made  her  brain  reel,  and  her  foot  trip 
n  her  habit  as  she  hurried  upstairs  again,  and  . 
nto  the  drawing-room  she  had  been  lounging 
about  so  pleasantly  just  now. 

The  letter  told  her  of  things  that  her  brow 
Durnt  to  read  about ;  of  things  that  her  heart 
sank  to  hear ;  of  deeds  which  make  a  woman 
shrink  from  their  perpetrator  when  that  perpe- 
trator is  the  woman's  husband.  All  Claude's 
wild  oats  were  brought  in  a  sheaf  and  placed 
Defore  her  in  this  letter ;  and  the  jealousy  of 
Jady  Lexley,  which  she  taught  herself  to  con- 
sider unjust  and  unmeaning,  was  cruelly  justi- 
fied. 

She  was  told  of  so  many  things,  poor  girl, 
,hat  Claude  would  rather  have  blown  his  brains 
3ut  than  that  she  should  have  learnt.  And  she 
sat  almost  paralysed  till  she  came  to  the  end 


120 


ON  GUARD. 


of  the  letter  and  found  that  it  was  anon} 
raous. 

So  1  she  could  not  return  it  to  the  writer,  as 
she  had  hazily  resolved  to  do,  without  a  wore 
of  acknowledgment.  She  could  not  meet  her 
(Bella  intuitively  felt  that  it  was  penned  by  a 
woman),  and  cut  her  and  scorn  her  as  such  a 
she-devil  deserved  to  be  cut  and  scorned. 
Agonized  as  she  had  been  by  that  reading, 
paralysed  as  her  faculties  were  for  the  moment, 
it  had  not  occurred  to  her  to  take  any  other 
notice  of  this  stab.  But  now  she  found  that  it 
was  a  stab  in  the  back,  and  she  must  forego 
the  taking  such  notice  as  that  even. 

For  a  few  moments — they  were  only  mo- 
ments, but  they  were  so  long — the  young  wife 
sat  uncertain  how  to  act.  Then  her  colour  and 
her  heart  rose,  and  she  tore  it  into  a  hundred 
fragments,  saying  to  herself,  "  Thank  God, 
Claude  need  never  know  it!"  This  was  her 
first  active  impulse.  The  doubt  what  to  do 
had  been  merely  born  of  passive  pain— of  be- 
wilderment and  surprise. 

No !  he  should  never  know  it !  She  took  it 
all  in  now.  The  pain  he  would  feel  at  her 
pain.  The  sore  agony  that  would  be  his  at  her 
doubting  him,  or  thinking  that  she  had  cause  to 
doubt  him.  She  shook  off  the  devil  of  distrust, 
and,  lighting  a  taper,  burnt  every  scrap  of  'the 
paper  that  had  told  the  shameful  tale  to  tinder, 
and  was  all  herself  again,  bright,  unclouded, 
sunny,  and  loving,  when  he  came  down  at  last 
to  ride  with  her. 

She  felt  so  sorry  for  having  read  such  things 
about  him  !  It  seemed  to  her  that  she  had  been 
so  far  baser  than  Claude,  the  exalted  in  appear- 
ance, would  have  been  under  the  same  circum- 
stances. She  had  read  on  to  the  end.  Claude 
would  never  have  gone  beyond  the  first  line 
that  aspersed  her.  The  feeling  of  being  so 
immeasurably  beneath  him  in  point  of  honour 
and  generosity  made  her  bear  on  the  snaffle 
with  a  heavier  hand  than  was  her  wont,  and 
adapt  herself  less  readily  to  the  curvature  of 
the  spine  with  which  Devilskin  marked  his 
resentment  of  the  change  in  her. 

"Now,  do  be  careful,  Bella,  and  don't  wob- 
ble," Claude  said,  somewhat  testily.  He  was 
dearly  fond  of  his  wife,  but  they  were  going 
into  the  park  now,  and  he  desired  that  she 
should  have  a  good  seat  in  the  eyes  of  all  men. 
This  spirit  of  exaction  was  only  another  form 
of  the  same  deep  love  she  was  showing  for  him 
by^her  toleration  in  regard  to  this  matter  which 
had  been  thrust  before  her  to-day. 

Bella  came  down  to  her  saddle  tighter  than 
before,  as  he  spoke.  She  was  conscious  of  an 
uncertainty  of  seat  and  hand  this  morning,  that 
must,  she  felt,  be  equally  trying  to  her  husband 
and  her  horse.  She  wished  so  much  to  please 
him  now — to  please  him  entirely,  and  without 
reservation,  and  to  make  him  feel  that  she  was 
a  good  thing  for  a  man  to  have,  even  though 
he  had  hankered  after  other  things  before  her. 
She  would  no  more  now  have  suffered  his  heart 
to  be  made  sore  by  a  knowledge  of  that  vile 
letter  than  she  would  have  stabbed  him  with 
her  own  hand.  It  almost  seemed  to  her,  as  she 
rode  along  by  his  side,  that  she  had  been  in 
error ;  that  she  had  been  the  faulty  one,  to  have 
received  such  a  letter. 

Who  ^ad  dared  to  write  it?     Her   heart 


swelled,  and  her  small,  well-bred  hand  grasped 
the  reins  with  such  convulsive  energy,  that  the 
additional  intensity  of  purpose  in  the  rider 
communicated  itself  to  the  fine  nerves  of  Devil- 
skin's  mouth,  and  caused  him  to  concentrate 
himself,  and  break  into  a  canter  that  was  grand, 
as  far  as  the  appearances  went,  but  of  little 
value  where  progress  was  concerned :  his  feet, 
that  is  to  say,  went  up  very  high,  and  came 
down  almost  precisely  in  the  same  spot;  and  he 
arched  his  neck,  aqd  put  at  least  ten  pounds  on 
himself  by  the  way  he  carried  his  tail ;  and, 
altogether,  made  a  very  pretty  little  performance. 
"I  say,  Bella!  that  won't  do,  you  know!" 
Claude  exclaimed,  holding  his  own  horse  in  with 
difficulty,  and  looking  with  annoyance  at  the 
very  questionable  effect  his  wife  was  producing 
on  the  minds  of  some  bystanders.  "  Stop  that 
Astley  business,  do!" 

"  Then  I  must  give  him  his  head,  and  then 
he'll  bolt,"  she  replied,  getting  Devilskin  well 
in  hand  as  she  spoke,  and  evidently  not  regard- 
ing the  possibility  of  his  bolting  in  a  very 
serious  light. 

"No,  he  won't! — steady,  boy,  steady! — wo- 
ho,  old  fellow!"  Claude  answered,  under  the 
mistaken  impression  that  his  voice  would  show 
Devilskin  the  folly  of  it,  whatever  the  "  it " 
might  be  that  Devilskin  was  contemplating. 

"  Come  on,  Claude,  then,"  she  said,  brightly, 
"  don't  stop  at  the  top,  but  wheel,  and  give 
them  a  breather  all  the  length  of  the  Row." 
They  were  nearing  the  end  of  the  row  by  Aps- 
ley  House  as  she  spoke,  and,  when  her  husband 
had  agreed,  they  drew  nearer  to  the  left  hand 
rails ;  she  lowered  her  hands,  and  the  two 
horses  went  off  at  a  fleet  gallop,  that  seemed  to 
bring  their  riders  closer  to  the  earth,  and 
slackened  the  girths,  and  made  the  air  whizz  as 
they  cut  through  it. 

They  reached  the  end,  and  wheeled  cleverly, 
the  two  horses  keeping  stride  for  stride,  and 
neither  showing  signs  of  taking  trouble  about  it. 
Suddenly,  both  horses  swerved ;  a  woman  was 
crossing,  in  the  idiotic,  temper-trying  way 
women  will  cross  the  Row,  regardless  alike  of 
the  knees  of  the  horses  who  are  sweeping  along, 
of  the  necks  of  the  riders,  who  get  many  an 
evil  jerk  through  their  means,  and  of  their  own 
stupidly-risked  lives.  As  Tom  Hood  says,  it 
must  be  "a  horrible  thing  to  be  groomed  by  a 
horse."  Nevertheless,  innumerable  women,  all 
of  the  readily-confounded,  easily-overpowered, 
and  perpetually-surprised  order,  do  apparently 
endeavour  to  test  the  horror  of  it  daily  through- 
out the  season. 

With  an  impatient  exclamation,  Claude  touch 
ed  his  horse  with  the  spur  directly  the  swerve 
was  recovered,  and  the  horse  responded  freely, 
and  went  along  even  as  he  had  been  going 
Defore.  As  a  slight  relief  to  the  feelings  which 
.hat  swerve  had  ruffled,  he  commenced  cursing 
,he  cause  of  it  aloud  to  Bella,  as  he  thought ; 
jut  he  pulled  up  on  finding  Bella  did  not  an- 
swer him,  and  riding  back  a  few  yards,  espied 
ler  at  the  spot  where  she  had  paused,  appa- 
rently for  no  better  purpose  than  to  look  after 
,he  ill-timed  human  interruption  to  that  deli- 
iiously  soul-and-body-freshening  breather  they 
md  been  having. 

"What  is  it?"  Claude  asked  affably,  riding 
ack. 


ON  GUARD. 


121 


"  I'm  sure  it's  Rock!"  she  replied. 

"Where?"  he  asked,  less  affably.  He  re- 
membered that  she  had  given  Rock  to  Stanley 
Villars,  and  he  did  not  care  to  see  her  betray 
the  smallest  further  interest  in  him.  It  was 
ungenerous,  considering  all  things ;  but,  on  the 
other  hand,  he  must  be  forgiven  for  not  con- 
sidering "all  things,"  since  he  was  ignorant  of 
many  of  them. 

"  There!  following  that  girl— see!" 

"  That  ass,  do  you  mean,  who  rushed  right 
across  us  just  now  ?" 

"  Yes,"  she  ceplied,  agreeing,  in  her  haste,  to 
the  uncomplimentary  epithet  he  bestowed  upon 
her  sister-woman,  without  the  expostulation 
that  might  have  ensued  under  ordinary  circum- 
\stances.  Then  she  rode  hastily  up  to  the  rails, 
Claude  keeping  by  her  side,  until  she  was  on  a 
line  with  the  woman  who  had  crossed  the  Row 
and  had  now  gained  the  greensward;  and 
close  by  that  woman  a  red  setter  was  flaunting 
along. 

"  I'm  sure  it's  Rock,"  Bella  said  aloud,  lean- 
ing forward  over  the  near  pommel  as  she  spoke. 
At  the  sound  of  the  name,  a  pretty,  fair  young 
face  was  turned  towards  her  inquiringly,  and 
the  dog  came  forward  in  a  series  of  airy  curves, 
and  leapt  up  on  to  her  habit,  showing  that  ho 
liked  to  meet  her  once  more,  by  the  shimmer 
of  his  tawny  eyes,  and  the  waving  of  his  well- 
fringed  tail. 

" Rock,  old  dog!  Poor  boy!  see  how  glad 
he  is,  Claude !" 

"  Yes,  wonderfully !   "Will  you  come  on  now  ?" 

!  Claude  replied,  coolly.     It  did  not  appear  to  be 

upon  the  cards  that  Rock  should  come  into  his 

;  own  possession,  and  he  had  no  morbid  feeling 

'  in  favour  of  another  man's  dog,  more  especially 

since  that  dog  had  become  that  other  man's 

under  circumstances  that  were  interesting  to 

himself,  but  not  agreeable  to  look  back  upon. 

"Yes;  wait  a  minute,  though.  I  wonder 
how  he  came  here  I"  she  continued,  in  a  lower 
voice,  to  her  husband.  "You  know  that  I 
gave  him  to  Stanley — do  you  think  he  is  sto- 
len ?" 

Claude  felt  uncomfortable.  Instinctively  he 
perceived  that  the  young  woman  with  the  pret- 
ty, fair  face  was  not  a  thief.  Let  her  be  what 
she  would,  there  was  not  that  amount  of  dia- 
bolical iniquity  in  her  which  is  essential  to  the 
professed  dog-stealer. 

"No,  come  along — nonsense!"  Major  Wal- 
singham replied,  riding  on  slowly,  and  wishing 
that  his  wife  would  not  make  a  "  spectacle  of 
herself  in  this  way." 

"But,  Claude!"  she  expostulated,  riding  after 
him,  and  still  encouraging  Rock  to  follow  with 
her  hand — "  But,  Claude !  do  stop !  He's  such 
a  dog,  to  be  about  with  anybodjr.  I'm  sure 
Stanley  would  have  taken  better  care  of  him, 
because  he's  valuable,  you  see.  I  will  ask  her 
how  she  came  by  him." 

The  owner  of  the  pretty,  fair  face  was  saun- 
tering along  just  inside  the  railings  all  this 
time,  watching  Claude  and  his  wife  attentively. 
The  baby-faced  beauty  had  taken  very  kindly 
to  the  big,  tawny,  loving  dog;  but  she  had 
done  so  in  unconsciousness.  Stanley  had  never 
told  her  how  Rock  became  his,  nor  indeed  had 
she  ever  cared  to  enquire  as  to  Rock's  antece- 
dents. But  now  that  a  beautiful  woman  ca- 


ressed the  dog  as  an  old  familiar  friend,  and 
alluded  to  Stanley  as  though  he  had  been  even 
as  the  dog  (an  old  familiar  friend,  namely), 
Rock's  antecedents  became  of  interest  to  her 
instantaneously,  and  her  memory  went  back 
jealously  to  every  glance,  every  word,  every 
touch  of  affection  he  had  ever  bestowed  in  her 
sight  and  hearing  on  the  red  setter,  Rock. 

"  Ask  her  nothing  of  the  kind.  Come  along, 
Bella !"  Claude  exclaimed,  impatiently.  "  What 
the  devil's  the  difference  to  you  whether  .the  dog 
is  stolen  or  not  ?" 

But,  in  such  matters,  Bella  could  still  be  wil- 
ful when  an  opportunity  for  being  so  arose.  It 
might  be  a  little  thing  to  Claude  that  there 
should  be  doubt  and  uncertainty  as  to  whom 
Rock  belonged  to  now ;  but  it  was  not  a  little 
thing  to  her.  She  had  been  very  fond  of  the 
dog,  and  the  dog  had  been  very  fond  of  her,  while 
their  union  lasted.  She  had  been  welcomed  bois- 
terously by  him  a  thousand  times  in  a  way  that 
showed  her  that  she  had  been  missed.  He  had 
been  her  own — he  had  been  very  much  admired 
— he  seemed  so  unfeignedly  rejoiced  to  meet  her' 
again  to-day,  though  there  was  no  bone  in  the 
case.  Besides,  it  was  not  a  little  thing  to  her 
that  Stanley  should  have  so  lightly  regarded  her 
present  as  either  to  have  lost  or  given  it  away. 
Accordingly  she  was  wilful,  and  would  not  at- 
tend to  Claude's  rather  decided  suggestion  that 
she  should  "  come  along." 

Still  leaning  forward  to  pat  the  dog,  who  kept 
jumping  up  at  her  horse's  side  every  minute, 
Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  turned  sharply  to  the 
railings,  and  drew  up  at  about  three  yards  from 
the  woman  who  was  sauntering  along  over  the 
sunny  sward. 

The  owner  of  the  lovely,  simple  face  paused 
and  looked  straight  in  the  bright,  brilliant, 
beautiful  one  of  her  rival — looked  into  it  with  a 
child's  admiration  for  what  is  beautiful,  with  a 
child's  transient  feeling  of  jealousy,  dread,  and 
distrust.  Bella  glanced  at  the  girl  a  trifle  super- 
ciliously. "  Stanley's  landlady's  daughter,  I 
should  say,"  she  thought.  "Impertinence!  to 
take  Rock  out."  "  I  beg  your  pardon,"  she  said, 
aloud,  "  but  I  used  to  know  this  dog.  Can  you 
tell  me  to  whom  he  belongs  now?"  And  the 
answer  was — "The  dog  belongs  to  my  husband, 
Mr.  Stanley  Villars." 

Then  Bella  was  silent,  and  rode  on. 


CHAPTER  XXXYI. 

DOUBT. 

IT  is  not  in  the  heart  of  man  to  triumph  out- 
wardly over  a  fallen,  or  say  tottering,  foe,  in 
the  "  I  told  you  so"  strain.  That  form  of  con- 
solation is  one  specially  affected  by  the  gentler 
sex,  who  lilt  these  little  lays  of  love  lachry- 
mosely  whenever  occasion  serves.  But  though 
it  is  not  in  the  heart  of  man  to  triumph  outward- 
ly, he  has  still  a  certain  feeling  of  sore  satisfac- 
tion when  an  evil,  which  attention  to  his  counsel 
would  have  obviated,  conies,  through  disregard 
of  that  counsel,  to  pass. 

Major  Walsingham  had  counselled  his  wife  to 
"come  along;"  had  asked  her  not  to  mix  her- 
self up  with  possible  dog-stealing  and  other 


122 


OX  GUARD. 


matters  in  which  she  had  no  concern,  merely 
out  of  a  manly  dislike  to  betraying  active 
interest  in  anything  that  was  out  of  his  own 
orbit.  He  had  no  intense  desire  to  be  fully 
acquainted  with  Eock's  present — no  loosely- 
packed,  but  still  valuable  to  the  owner,  bundle 
of  memories  connected  with  Rock's  past.  The 
girl  so  idly  sauntering  along,  through  the  noon- 
tide heat  of  an  August  day,  was  too  pretty,  too 
marked,  tawdry,  and  observation-compelling 
altogether,  for  intercourse  between  her  and  his 
well-known  Bella  to  be  desirable  in  that  place. 
Therefore,  he  had  not  alone  wished,  but  had 
told  his  wife  to  pass  on  and  be  silent.  And  his 
wife  had  developed  her  old  infirmity,  wilfulness, 
and  had  pulled  up  effusively  to  speak  to  a  girl 
whom  she  didn't  know,  about  a  dog  for  whom 
she  ought  no  longer  to  have  cared. 

The  punishment  came  quickly  after  the  of- 
fence. Delicacy  of  feeling  restrained  him  from 
looking  direct  at  her,  to  see  how  deep  the  lash, 
contained  in  that  single  sentence  the  baby-faced 
beauty  had  spoken,  cut.  But  that  it  had  cut, 
end  cut  deeply  too,  he  knew,  through  the 
agency  of  that  animal  magnetism  which  makes 
us  writhe,  and  wince,  and  shiver,  when  the  one 
we  love  is  doing  these  things  in  our  immediate 
atmosphere.  For  two  minutes  and  a  half  he 
felt  sympathetically  tender  towards  Bella ;  she 
had  "  got  it,"  he  knew,  from  a  quarter  whence 
she  had  so  little  anticipated  it.  Then  he  re- 
flected that  Bella  had  no  right  to  care  about 
Stanley  Villars  having  allied  himself  to  what 
he  (Claude)  denominated  " a  queer  lot;"  and 
when  he  thus  reflected,  the  delicacy  which  had 
caused  him  to  refrain  from  looking  at  the 
slightly  wounded,  deserted  him,  and  he  glanced 
askance  at  his  wife,  and  grew  red  and  re- 
sentful. 

Bella's  feelings,  meanwhile,  were  mixed ;  but 
the  worst  ingredients  in  that  mixture  were  of  a 
nobler  sort  than  Claude  imagined  them  to  be. 
Whenever  she  had  thought  about  Stanley  at 
all  (and  she  had,  woman-like,  thought  about 
him  several  times  since  she  had  learnt,  through 
the  medium  of  his  writings,  that  be  had  it  in 
him  to  rise  and  distinguish  himself),  she  had 
been  conscious  of  a  half-hope  that  the  wound 
she  had  made  would  be  healed  in  time.  She 
had  thought,  in  a  sketchy,  undefined  way,  that 
Stanley  would  get  over  her  defalcation  and  be 
happy,  after  an  exalted  pattern,  with  an  exalted 
wife — a  superior  woman,  with  a  lofty  forehead 
and  a  bone  in  her  nose.  A  woman  whom  she 
(Bella)  could  respect  and  like,  and  never  feel 
an  atom  jealous  of,  as  being  one  able  to  sup- 
plant her.  A  woman  with  money  and  good 
connections,  and  a  power  altogether  of  making 
Stanley  thoroughly  comfortable.  A  woman  of 
whom  she  could  never,  for  one  instant,  enter- 
tain the  idea  that  Stanley  had  loved  her,  with 
a  duplicate  of  that  passion  he  had  felt  for  her- 
self. A  woman,  sensible,  good,  and  discreet, 
who  would  keep  Stanley  straight,  and  redeem 
him  from  the  poverty-stricken  bondage  and 
slavery  he  was  now  in;  and  who  would  be 
wise  enough  to  -accept  the  fact  that  she  was 
powerless  to  efface  from  his  memory  his  love's 
young  dream. 

Her  feelings  were  very  mixed.  This  girl, 
with  the  face  that  was  lovely  as  an  angel's — 
ay,  lovelier  than  any  pictured  angel's  can  be, 


for  there  was  human  warmth  and  womaniy 
love  in  it ! — this  girl  was  wanting,  on  the  sur- 
face, in  all  those  attributes  with  which  she, 
Bella,  had  accredited  the  one  whom  it  might 
be  well  for  Stanley  to  marry.  She  was  young, 
lovely,  love-inspiring !  but  she  was  not  a  lady. 
Stanley's  marriage  with  her  had  been  the  result 
of  her  effect  on  his  heart ;  therefore  it  was  not 
the  offspring  of  judgment  only,  as  Bella  would 
have  liked  to  think  of  any  alliance  he  formed. 
Her  heart  swelled  and  her  colour  rose.  To 
have  been  cast  out  from  Stanley's  heart — from 
the  heart  of  any  one  who  had  once  loved  her — 
by  such  an  one  as  this. 

They  had  kept  the  silence  so  long  after  that 
sentence  the  baby-faced  beauty  had  uttered,  that 
there  was  something  awkward  in  breaking  it. 
At  length,  when  Bella  did  so,  she  was  the  first 
to  speak  naturally.  Claude  was  conscious  of 
feeling  suspicious — she  was  unconscious  of  any- 
thing of  the  kind. 

"Do  you  think  she  told  the  truth,  Claude?" 
she  asked  abruptly,  as  their  horses  went  up  that 
slight  elevation  in  the  Row  at  a  steady  gallop, 
that  admitted  of  no  excuse  for  further  silence, 
as  the  stirring  trot  of  a  few  minutes  before  had 
done.  "Do  you  think  she  told  the  truth, 
Claude?"  * 

"  Probably !" 

"I  don't  think  it  probable,"  Mrs.  Walsingham 
exclaimed  determinately.  She  thought  it  quite 
the  reverse  of  probable,  in  fact;  and  it  seemed 
to  her  a  mean  estimate  for  Claude  to  have  form- 
ed of  Stanley  Villars. 

"  It's  not  worth  arguing  about.  Slacken  your 
curb,  Bella ;  if  you  go  on  pulling  at  him  in  that 
way,  he'll  serve  you  a  trick  some  fine  day,  and 
be  off  when  you  don't  expect  it." 

"But  it  is  worth  arguing  about,  Claude.  I'm 
interested  in  Stanley's  well-being  still,  whatever 
you  may  be ;  and  I  do  think,  after  all,  that  you 
might  feel  a  little  for  him." 

"  My  feeling  for  him  wouldn't  do  any  good ; 
he  has  chosen  his  own  path ;  for  God's  sake  let 
him  follow  it  in  peace." 

"  How  can  I — how  can  you  expect  me  to  be 
so  indifferent  about  an  old  friend?"  she  asked, 
almost  piteously. 

"  I  thought  the  old  flame  of  friendship  had 
died  out.  If  it  hasn't,  and  its  ashes  are  liable 
to  burst  out  into  a  blaze  at  any  moment,  I  can 
only  say  that  it  will  be  unpleasant  for  me." 

She  shook  her  head  vehemently,  and  drew 
Devilskin  nearer  to  his  side. 

"  Not  for  you,  Claude — don't  say  that ;  what- 
ever you  may  be,  you're  not  ungenerous." 

He  made  no  reply.  To  him  ii  seemed  that 
she  was  begging  the  question.  He  did  not  re- 
cognise the  truth,  which  was,  that  the  qualities 
she  most  adored,  she  strove  to  deck  her  hus- 
band in. 

"You're  not  that,"  she  repeated;  "besides, 
if  I  may  not  speak  to  you  about  a  thing,  to 
whom  may  I  speak?" 

"  Couldn't  you  hold  your  tongue  about  it  ?" 
he  suggested,  quietly.  In  his  heart  he  was  sorry 
that  things  should  be  going  so  utterly  wrong  as 
they  appeared  to  be  going  with  Stanley  Villars. 
But  he  remembered  the  past,  and  it  went  against 
his  taste — to  the  dictates  of  which  he  paid  more 
attention  than  to  those  of  his  heart — that  his 
wife  should  mix  herself  up,  identify  herself  in 


1 


ON  GUARD. 


123 


any  way,  with  Stanley's  dearer  interests.  Add- 
ed to  this  feeling,  which  he  would  have  experi- 
enced under  any  circumstances,  there  was  the 
natural  shrinking  a  man  would  be  sure  to  feel 
against  aught  dubious  coming  in  contact  with 
one  dear  and  precious  to  him.  Now  Bella  was 
very  dear  and  precious  to  him,  for  all  his  occa- 
sional lack  of  judgment  in  his  treatment  of  her. 
She  was  very  dear  and  precious  to  him,  and 
there  was  a  very  dubious  air  about  the  baby- 
faced  beauty  who  was  sauntering  through  the 
sunbeams. 

Major  Walsingham  asked,  "  Couldn't  you  hold 
your  tongue  about  it?"  in  a  quiet,  amiably 
superior,  tolerant-to-your-weakness  way,  that  it 
is  hard  to  listen  to  and  maintain  repose.  He 
intended  his  remark  to  be  taken  as  a  definite 
and  satisfactory  conclusion  to  the  subject  by 
Bella.  He  meant  it  to  stop  further  discus- 
sion, to  wind  up  the  matter  gracefully,  leaving 
her  in  the  position  of  one  whose  erring  judgment 
had  been  set  straight,  and  who  was  silently 
grateful,  as  became  one  conscious  of  inferiority 
in  experience  and  mind.  But  this  was  Bella's 
misfortune.  She  did  not  think  about  Claude's 
larger  experience,  and  had  she  thought  about  it 
at  all,  she  would  have  been  in  doubt  as  to  his 
having  the  larger  mind  of  the  two.  Had  she 
felt  that  he  did  possess  it,  sorely  as  she  might 
have  disliked  his  snubbing  her,  she  would  have 
known  through  it  all  that  he  was  to  be  obeyed, 
and  so  would  have  stood  it  better.  As  it  was, 
she  fretted  under  his  assumption  of  power  and 
superiority,  even  as  her  horse  fretted  under  the 
curb,  of  which  she  was  giving  him  more  than  a 
touch. 

"No,  I  can't  hold  my  tongue  about  it, 
Claude;  and  why  should  I?  Her  'husband, 
Mr.  Stanley  Villars,'  indeed !  Couldn't  we  find 
out  about  him  ?  It  will  be  shocking  if  he  has 
married  in  such  a  way !  Shocking  for  Florry !" 

He  laughed.  They  were  walking  their  horses 
now,  and  on  across  the  grass  their  eyes  would 
travel  after  the  forms  of  the  woman  and  the 
dog  who  had  given  rise  to  the  discussion. 

"  You  were  not  always  so  careful  of  Florry's 
feelings,"  he  said. 

"  It  was  love  for  you  made  me  careless  then; 
come,  sir!  " 

She  turned  her  face  to  him  as  she  said  it,  and 
the  softened  light  in  her  eyes,  the  heightened 
colour  on  her  cheeks,  and,  above  all,  that  mar- 
vellous inflection  of  the  voice  which  cannot  be 
affected,  did  its  rightful  work. 

"My  dear  girl,  I  know  that,"  he  replied; 
"  show  your  love  for  me,  dear,  by  not  disturbing 
yourself  and  bothering  me  about  what  is  done 
and  can't  be  helped.  Stanley  has  chosen  his 
own  path — it  mayn't  be  a  pleasant  one,  but  it's 
one  from  which  you  can't  turn  him ;  and  it  isn't 
pleasant  for  me  to  hear  you  always  going  into 
rhapsodies  about  him ;  the  day's  gone  by  for 
your  being  his  guardian  angel." 

She  looked  at  him  keenly,  in  the  attempt  to 
discover  whether  jealousy  had  a  share  in  the 
feeling  which  prompted  him  to  utter  these 
words,  or  not.  He  ought  not  to  have  been 
jealous  of  her — of  her  who  had  put  the  paltry 
feeling  so  entirely  out  of  court  about  him.  Her 
love  for  him  was  to  the  full  as  deep  and  true  as 
his  for  her ;  and  still,  poison-fraught  as  was  that 
letter  she  had  received  this  morning,  it  had 


caused  her  no  pang  save  the  one  grand  one  that 
any  person  could  have  deemed  her  weak  and 
base  enough  to  be  influenced  against  her  hus- 
band for  one  instant  without  sufficient  cause. 
Whereas  he  was  jealous  now  of  her  openly  be- 
traying that  she  still  felt  an  interest  in  whether 
Stanley  Villars  sank  or  swam.  He  sat  hia 
horse  like  a  centaur,  and  she  had  run  the  gaunt- 
let of  opposition  for  his  dear  sake ;  yet  for  all 
these  things  (and  they  were  mighty  links)  she 
wished  that  he  possessed  more  magnanimity. 


CHAPTER  XXXVII. 

A  HARD  CASE. 

WE  have  probably  all  heard  that  the  merry, 
merry  sunshine  makes  the  heart  so  gay.  It  is 
an  axiom  that  has  been  set  to  music,  and  har- 
mony always  imparts  an  appearance  of  truth  to 
a  statement.  When  the  sentiment  is  trilled  out 
by  a  songstress  in  satin  under  a  glaring  gase- 
lier, it  naturally  strikes  us  as  veracious.  The 
heat  of  the  sun  in  the  open — anything,  any- 
where!— is  sure  to  be  regarded  as  enviable, 
even  as  gaiety-provoking,  when  our  heads  are 
throbbing  from  artificial  heat,  strongly  impreg- 
nated with  patchouli. 

But  there  are  certain  conditions  of  mind 
when  the  merry,  merry  sunshine  stabs  rather 
than  soothes.  When  we  are  unappreciated,  un- 
successful, uncared  for.  When  the  light  of  love 
has  gleamed  over  us,  and  for  some  reason 
gleams  over  us  no  longer.  When  the  present 
is  very  dark  and  dull,  and  there  seems  to  be 
nothing  better  in  store.  When  all  the  hopes 
we  ever  had,  lowly  as  they  may  have  been,  are 
fading  fast.  When  the  sense  of  our  own  ina- 
bility is  upon  us  crushingly,  and  we  perceive 
the  wounding  truth  that  we  are  powerless  of 
ourselves  to  help  ourselves.  When  we  feel  left 
behind — not  alone  that,  but  trampled  down  by 
Fate,  against  whom  we  sulkily  acknowledge 
that  it  is  useless  to  struggle.  When  any  or  all 
of  these  things  are,  how  terrible  is  the  sun- 
shine ! 

I  suppose  that  we  have  all  felt  the  terror  of 
it — all  of  us,  at  least,  who  have  temporal  hopes, 
fears,  and  aspirations  beyond  the  day.  The 
brightness  of  it  mocks,  and  the  warmth  of  it 
burns  us,  and  the  glory  of  it  irradiates  each  one 
but  ourselves.  We  lose  sight  of  the  fact,  that 
all  these  sensations  are  born  of  our  own  sense 
of  defeat,  perhaps— or  of  dyspepsia,  or  disap- 
pointment— therefore  we  do  not  look  further 
back  for  causes,  and  discern  that  each  one  of 
these  things  is  probably  the  offspring  of  incom- 
petence, unworthiness,  or — more  likely  still — of 
a  weakness  of  will,  a  faltering  of  purpose,  which 
prevented  our  grasping  and  retaining  firmly 
that  which  we  desired  to  have.  All  things 
come  to  him  who  knows  how  to  wait.  All 
things  are  to  be  had  by  him  who  knows  how 
to  take. 

"  He  either  fears  his  fate  too  much, 

Or  his  deserts  are  small, 
Who  dares  not  put  it  to  the  touch. 
And  win  or  lose  it  all." 

That  which  has  been  done  before  may  be  done 
again;  but  there  are  certain  phases  of  feeling 


124 


ON  GUARD. 


when  one  loses  sight  of  this  fact,  be  one's  de- 
termination to  win  eventually  what  it  may. 
It  is  while  in  the  state  of  bodily  and  mental 
languor  that  these  phases  produce,  that  the 
merry,  merry  sunshine  becomes  a  trifle  over- 
powering, and  altogether  a  thing  from  which  to 
shrink,  as  one  that  places  your  misery  in  a 
stronger  light. 

Now,  poor  Marian  Villars  had  no  particular 
will,  and  no  design  of  life  worth  carrying  out, 
even  had  the  will  to  do  so  been  hers.  Had 
things  been  bright  and  well  with  her,  had  her 
home  been  happy,  and  her  husband  loving,  and 
her  wardrobe  well  furnished,  she  would  have 
been  as  blithe  as  a  bird  even  when  a  fog  was 
hovering  over  the  land.  But  none  of  these 
things  were,  nor  were  they  likely  to  be,  as  far 
as  she  could  see,  and  her  lights  led  her  tolera- 
bly correctly.  Therefore  depression  reigned  in 
her  soul,  and  the  sunshine  could  not  remove  it. 
There  was  no  gaiety  in  the  heart  of  the  poor 
pretty  little  saunterer  through  the  sunbeams ; 
the  latter  merely  made  the  fact  of  her  cloak 
being  rusty  and  her  dress  shabby  more  patent 
to  her. 

She  had  come  out  this  day  for  a  walk,  be- 
cause the  monotony  of  sitting  at  home,  sur- 
rounded by  ugliness,  and  stifled  by  the  heat, 
had  become  almost  unbearable.  Stanley  had 
asked  her  to  "go  out  and  get  a  little  air,"  too, 
partly  because  he  fancied  that,  like  a  bird,  she 
was  pining  for  the  sunshine,  and  partly  because 
she  had  a  restless  way  of  moving  about  in  the 
room,  causing  his  brain  to  reel 

His  brain  often  reeled  now,  poor  fellow! 
He  told  himself  that  it  was  the  heat,  and  that 
when  the  winter  came  he  should  be  all  right 
again — more  especially  if  he  could  take  that 
"little  rest"  which  amiable  outsiders  were 
always  recommending  to  him  in  the  fervent 
way  people  do  recommend  things  which,  if 
accepted,  will  cost  them  nothing.  But  in  the 
meantime  that  reeling  of  the  brain  was  a  hard 
thing  to  bear. 

Day  by  day  the  dread  grew  and  strengthened 
within  him  that  he  was  missing  his  chance — 
doing  himself  an  injustice  which  he  could  never 
recall — burning  his  candle  at  both  ends — wast- 
ing material  which,  if  properly  managed,  might 
have  made  such  a  blaze  as  should  have  com- 
manded observation.  Day  by  day  this  dread 
grew  and  strengthened  within  him,  until  it 
attained  such  power,  that  to  think  of  it  was 
to  paralyse  his  hand  and  numb  his  faculties, 
and  drive  him  to  seek  oblivion  in  anything 
that  came  to  hand — so  hastening  the  end  he 
feared. 

He  was  getting  irritably  alive  to  sounds; 
not  only  to  those  which  render  day  hideous  in 
the  streets,  but  to  such  as  were  partly  the 
conjurations  of  his  own  brain.  Noise  and 
pressure,  that  was  all  he  suffered  from,  he 
Baid,  when  any  one  had  time  to  ask  him, 
"What  was  the  matter?"  or  "Whether  he 
wasn't  quite  right  ?"  Noise  and  pressure ! — 
that  was  all. 

Heads — editorial  heads — had  been  shaken 
once  or  twice  over  the  results  of  several  hours 
of  his  hardest  and  most  earnest  labour,  and  he 
had  been  entreated  sharply  to  write  more  care- 
fully—  more  coherently — more  as  if  he  had 
something  to  say  and  were  capable  of  saying 


it.  At  last,  the  day  before  Bella  and  Rock 
met  in  the  park,  he  was  given  to  understand 
by  the  ruling  pow.er  of  a  journal  to  whose 
staff  he  was  attached,  that  he  might  go  his 
ways  without  let  or  hindrance  from  them. 
"  His  writings  had  been  ravings  merely  lately," 
he  was  told,  "and  the  public  wouldn't  stand 
them." 

Dreamily  he  accepted  his  dismissal — hazily 
he  held  that  there  was  justice  in  the  fiat  which, 
pronounced,  left  him  a  more  completely  ruined 
man  than  he  had  been  before.  A  little  sooner 
or  a  little  later,  it  was  of  small  consequence. 
The  end  that  was  inevitable — that  he  had  felt 
for  some  time  to  be  inevitable — would  come. 
He  would  fall  and  be  forgotten,  and  the  place 
where  he  fell  would  be  unmarked  1  He  went 
home  with  his  head  aching,  as  the  head  whose 
brain  is  overtasked  will  ache,  and  lay  down, 
caring  little  whether  or  not  he  should  ever  rise 
up  again. 

There  had  been  a  little  balm  brought  even 
to  him  in  the  evening.  One  of  his  own  frater- 
nity— a  man  who  was  living  a  from-hand-to- 
mouth  existence  by  his  pen,  and  living  it  in  a 
light-hearted  way,  as  yet — came  and  stirred 
him  up,  sacrificing  his  own  leisure  to  the  by  no 
means  easy  task,  and  not  alone  offering  to  do 
him  good  service,  but  doing  it. 

"  It  will  be  all  right,  old  boy,"  he  said  to 
Stanley,  in  reference  to  that  dismissal  from  the 
journal,  which  had  left  him  in  a  worse  plight 
than  before.  "It  will  be  all  right,  old  boy; 
they've  put  me  on  in  your  place  for  a  few 


Stanley  looked  at  him  vaguely.  It  mattered 
very  little  to  him  by  whom  he  was  superseded, 
since  he  held  himself  dismissed.  He  believed 
the  man  meant  it  kindly;  but  it  was  a  queer 
form  for  kindness  to  take,  the  promotion  being 
on  the  occasion  of  his  (Stanley's)  downfall. 

"  Only  for  a  few  days — only  to  keep  it  open 
for  you,"  his  colleague  went  on  quickly.  "I 
tell  you  what;  it's  all  settled.  I've  arranged 
up  there"  ("up  there"  meant  the  office  of  the 
newspaper)  "  that  I'll  do  your  work  till  you're 
all  right  again,  on  the  understanding  that  you'll 
do  mine  by-and-by  when  I  knock  up ;  do  you 
see?" 

Stanley  felt  very  wooden  about  the  head,  but 
he  contrived  to  nod,  and  say  "Yes."  Dimly 
he  felt  that  "that  young  fellow  Bligh"  was 
being  kind  and  generous  to  him — but  only 
dimly. 

"  So  that's  all  arranged  then,  and  don't 
bother  yourself  about  it  any  more,"  Bligh  went 
on,  as  cheerily  as  he  could,  with  the  conviction 
oppressing  him  that  "poor  Villars  would  never 
do  any  fellow's  work,  or  his  own  either."  He 
had  seen  this  thing  creeping  over  other  men 
before,  but  he  had  never  been  touched  as  now, 
for  the  men  had  been  older  than  Stanley  Villars, 
and  their  breaking  down  more  gradual. 

Very  quietly,  for  a  few  hours,  did  Stanley 
resign  himself  to  the  repose  which  was  thrust 
upon  him.  But  the  next  day  he  grew  restless, 
and  declared  that  while  he  lived  he  must  write. 
Then  the  stabbing  and  the  reeling  assailed  him 
afresh,  and  he  became  agonizingly  alive  to  the 
lightest  sound  in  the  room.  Then  it  was  that 
he  begged  Marian  to  go  out  for  a  walk.  "  Do 
go  and  leave  me  to  myself,  dear,  till  1  have 


ON  GUARD. 


125 


done  this,"  he  said,  letting  his  pen  stray  down 
and  then  ramble  over  a  slip ;  "  and  take  that 
dog."  Rock's  regular  breathing  fell  upon  some- 
thing in  the  top  of  his  head  as  the  incessant 
droppings  of  water  might  have  done.  When 
he  was  left,  he  drank  brandy  with  laudanum  in 
it  till  the  present  passed  from  him,  and  he 
found  himself  once  more  in  a  broad  old  rose- 
embowered  window,  at  the  feet  of  Bella  Yane. 

He  was  haggard,  wild-eyed,  terrible  to  look 
upon,  when  his  wife  came  home.  "  You  have 
been  working  till  your  head  aches  again,  Stan- 
ley," she  said  complainingly ;  "and  so  does 
mine — the  sun's  so  hot  to-day." 

"  Is  it  ?''  he  asked  absently. 

"Is  it!  How  can  you  say  that?  And  oh! 
how  can  you  bear  to  sit  with  it  pouring  down 
on  your  head  in  that  way?"  Then  she  turned 
to  the  table  on  which  their  dinner  was  already 
placed,  and  asked  him,  "  Would  he  not  come 
and  have  some  ?" 

"  No,"  he  replied  peevishly.  «  And  I  wish, 
Marian,  you  would  teach  that  girl  not  to  come 
in  to  this  room ;  her  elbows  are  enough  to 
drive  a  man  mad." 

The  girl's— the  luckless  maid-of-all-work's — 
elbows  had  always  been  a  sore  point  with 
Stanley,  as  obviously  they  were  sore  points 
with  their  unhappily  raw-boned  possessor. 
They  protruded  themselves  into  everything — 
they  courted  observation,  it  appeared  to  him. 
Those  elbows,  and  the  way  their  owner  had  of 
charging  at  the  stairs,  and  then  stumbling  up 
or  down  them,  as  the  case  might  be,  had  been 
colossal  tributary  streams  to  the  ocean  of  his 
woe.  He  had  been  ready  to  beseech  the  girl, 
more  than  once,  to  pull  her  sleeves  down  and 
pick  up  her  feet— to  cultivate  a  higher  action, 
in  fact.  But  he  had  never  done  it,  and  now 
the  sight  and  the  hearing  of  her  had  become 
unendurable. 

"  She  shall  not  come  near  you  again,  Stanley," 
the  poor  little  wife  half  sobbed.  "  I'd  send  her 
away,  dear,  for  I  hate  her,  and  her  elbows,  too 
— but  I  have  no  money  left." 

Instinctively  he  put  his  hand  in  his  pocket 
and  pulled  out  his  purse.  "  Then  pay  her — get 
rid  of  her  at  once,"  he  said,  handing  it  to  his 
wife.  When  she  opened  it  her  face  fell  a  little, 
and  a  few  tears  came  into  her  eyes. 

"  What  is  it  ?  "  he  asked  carelessly. 

"It's  empty,  Stanley,"  she  said,  showing  it 
to  him. 

"  Then  I  have  no  money  left  either,  and — 
and—"  and  then  he  burst  into  tears.  As  he 
wept  on  a  change  came  over  her ;  those  tears 
of  his  touched  that  "  right  chord"  in  her  which 
is,  I  believe,  in  every  human  being ;  and  the 
thrill  it  caused  strung  her  up  to  do  the  work 
that  was  needed  of  her. 

Her  little  idle  dreams,  her  little  venial  vani- 
ties, her  little  childish  discontents  and  repin- 
ings,  vanished  into  thin  air  before  this  woe 
which  she  felt  to  be  coming  upon  him — upon 
them  both.  She  got  up,  fraught  with  that  feel- 
ing of  concealment,  that  beautiful  deceit  which 
God  gives  to  women  in  such  hours  as  these — 
got  up  and  went  over  to  him,  seeming  not  to 
see  his  grief,  not  to  be  affected  by  it,  smiling 
and  being  at  once  brighter  and  softer  than  she 
had  ever  been  before. 

For  a  time,  a  brief  time,  she  soothed  him 


strangely.  He  forgot  his  rapidly-increasing  in- 
capacity, he  forgot  that  he  had  no  money  in 
his  purse — no  prospect  in  his  profession — no 
friends  in  the  world,  as  she  sat  on  a  low  stool 
by  the  side  of  the  couch  on  which  he  had 
stretched  himself,  and  talked  him  into  the 
dreamy  state  he  had  been  in  when  first  he 
opened  his  eyes  upon  her  away  in  the  little 
house  by  the  Regent's  Park. 

"Marian,  pet!"  he  said  to  her  at  last,  "if  it 
were  not  for  what  is  before  you,  poor  child,  I 
couldn't  be  thankful  enough  for  having  married 
you." 

Then  the  change  that  had  come  upon  her 
when  he  shed  those  hot  tears  deepened,  and 
she  almost  coo'd  forth  a  low,  murmuring  an- 
swer that  was  like  a  song  of  gratitude  and 
love. 

But  their  case  was  very  hard ! 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII. 

ENGAGED. 

THERE  was  much  sober  satisfaction  in  Sir 
Gerald  Villars'  house.  Florence  had  repaid  all 
Lady  Villars'  care  and  anxiety.  Florence  had 
approved  herself  sweet  and  amenable  to  good 
advice,  as  Lady  Villars  had  always  trusted  that 
she  would  do  some  day  or  other.  Florence,  in 
a  word,  was  going  to  be  married  I 

The  bridegroom  elect — a  Mr.  Chester — was 
as  different  as  light  from  darkness,  milk  from 
brandy,  from  her  first  love,  Claude  Walsing- 
ham.  He  was  a  handsome  young  man,  tall, 
with  beautiful  eyes,  and  a  booby. 

He  had  been  a  playmate  of  Lady  Villars'  in 
her  childish  days,  a  "great  friend"  of  the  im- 
maculate Carrie's  in  her  girlish  unmarried  ones. 
Since  her  marriage  with  Sir  Gerald,  Fred  Ches- 
ter had  been  given  the  freedom  of  her  house. 
He  came  in  and  out  like  a  tame  dog ;  he  was  so 
very  inoffensive.  ^ 

In  addition  to  being  inoffensive  he  was  very 
kind-hearted.  Florence  had  melted  towards 
him  because  he  looked  depressed  whenever 
Stanley  was  spoken  of.  She  thought  that  it 
was  warm  feeling  and  tender  interest  for  Stan- 
ley which  caused  this  depression.  In  reality, 
it  arose  from  a  shadowy  notion  he  had  that  he 
ought  to  say  something,  and  an  utter  inability 
to  think  of  anything  to  say  on  the  subject. 
However,  his  looks  touched  Florence.  He 
would  never,  she  felt  sure  of  that,  keep  a  sister 
from  a  dearly-loved  brother  merely  because 
that  brother  was  under  a  cloud.  He  would 
help  her  to  seek,  and  redeem  (if  redemption 
were  necessary,  which  she  doubted),  and  make 
Stanley  happy  and  comfortable  again!  This 
conviction,  and  a  certain  feeling  of  being  an 
incubus  upOn  Carrie,  of  which  she  could  not 
dispossess  herself,  swayed  her.  So  when  Fred 
Chester  proposed  to  her  she  accepted  him; 
Lady  Villars  having  paved  the  way  well  for 
him,  by  telling  her  sister-in-law  many  times 
during  the  week  previous  to  said  proposal,  that 
"  her  own  sisters  wanted  to  come  and  stay 
with  her ;  but  of  course,  though  she  wished  it 
very  much,  she  couldn't  have  them  yet."  And 
when  Florence  asked  "Why  not?"  she  had 


J26 


ON  GUARD. 


gone  on  to  say,  "  When  you  are  married  I  shall 
be  able  to,  but  Gerald  wouldn't  like  the  house 
be  sistered  in  that  way." 

Florence's  heart  went  out  more  tenderly  than 
ever  to  Stanley  after  it  thus  being  made  mani- 
fest that  she  was  not  too  highly  prized  by  the 
brother  who  was  left.  She  began  to  feel  in  the 
way ;  she  began  to  yearn  for  a  stand-point  of 
her  own,  from  whence  she  should  dare  to  stretch 
out  her  hand  to  Stanley.  Here  she  was  ham- 
pered by  a  dozen  of  those  heavy  chains  which, 
though  invisible  to  the  casual  visitor,  too  often 
eat  into  the  flesh  of  the  denizen  on  sufferance  in 
a  house.  Gerald  himself  was  kind  and  loving 
to  her,  but  he  did  not  "notice  things,"  and  he 
had  a  pious  horror  of  Carrie  being  upset.  Flo- 
rence was  a  very  soft  and  gentle  woman.  Had 
she  been  other,  she  could  easily  have  brought 
her  sister-in-law  to  understand  that  she  gave 
fair  payment  by  her  presence  for  all  favours  re- 
ceived. But  she  was  meek,  and  with  the  meek 
Lady  Yillars  was  apt  to  be  merciless. 

In  reality.  Lady  Villars  meant  very  kindly 
by  her  husband's  sister.  It  seemed  to  her  a  sad 
and  a  sorrowful  thing  that  Florence  should  be 
suffered  to  pursue  her  path  in  solitude  any 
longer;  therefore  any  gentle  spurrings  that 
might  urge  her  to  quit  said  path,  Lady  Villars 
deemed  herself  perfectly  justified  in  administer- 
ing. It  was  for  Florence's  good  she  desired  to 
see  her  with  an  active,  living,  present  interest 
once  more.  "When  Florence  had  this  she  would 
leave  off  mutely  raking  over  those  ashes  of  the 
past  —  her  shattered  girlish  devotion  to  her 
brother  and  to  her  brother's  friend. 

Moreover,  Lady  Villars  was  a  woman  on 
whom  the  claims  of  her  own  kindred  pressed 
strongly.  She  had  three  sisters — three  fair  un- 
wedded  young  beings,  all  with  short  noses  and 
plump  faces,  and  a  marked  disinclination  to  re- 
main longer  than  was  absolutely  necessary  in 
maiden  meditation. 

"  It  does  seem  unkind  never  to  have  the  girls 
to  stay  with  me,"  she  would  say  to  Florence; 
"  I  am  sure  they  would  be  very  much  admired." 
On  which  poor  Florence  would  feel  guiltily  that 
her  unmarried  presence  in  her  own  brother's 
house  was  held  by  her  brother's  wife  to  be 
detrimental  to  that  lady's  sisters. 

There  was  kindness  to  a  certain  degree,  and 
vast  magnanimity,  in  Lady  Villars  ordaining 
that  Fred  Chester  should  marry  Florence.  He 
was  very  tractable,  and  would  have  bowed  him- 
self at  the  feet  of  one  of  the  short-faced  beauties 
had  the  word  of  command  been  given.  But  it 
was  not  given,  for  Lady  Villars  had  ideas  on 
the  subject  of  justice ;  and  it  appeared  to  her 
only  fair  that  Florence,  being  the  sister  of  the 
head  of  the  house,  should  be  given  the  first 
chance. 

So  Florence  was  given  it,  and  Florence  took 
it — not  very  gladly  it  must  be  admitted,  but 
gratefully  nevertheless.  She  had  no  ecstatic 
notions  of  beatitude  resulting  to  herself  from 
this  marriage — such  notions  faded  away  from 
her  for  ever  the  day  she  heard  Bella  was  to 
marry  Claude — but  she  did  hope  great  things 
from  it  for  Stanley.  For  Fred  Chester  was 
wealthy  and  tractable,  and  he  always,  as  I  have 
said  before,  looked  depressed  when  Stanley  was 
spoken  about. 

It  was  now  August,  and  they  were  to  be 


married  in  the  first  week  in  September,  then  to 
go  off  and  be  happy  on  the  Continent  for  a 
month,  and  then  return  in  October  to  Fred 
Chester's  place  in  Suffolk  for  the  partridge  shoot- 
ing. It  was  a  long  time  to  be  out  of  town. 
They  would  not  be  back  till  January.  Florence 
grew  brave  as  she  thought  of  it,  and  determined 
that  she  would  ask  Fred  to  take  her  to  see 
Stanley.  It  would  be  best  to  obey  him  in 
future ;  the  onus  was  off  her  of  attending  longer 
to  Lady  Villars'  ideas. 

But  Lady  Villars  had  been  beforehand  with 
her.  "If  Florence — dear  girl!  she  has  some 
sentimental  notions — wants  you  to  countenance 
her  intercourse  with  Stanley,  don't  do  it,  Fred," 
she  had  said  to  her  favourite  vassal. 

"  No,  I  think  she'd  better  not,  because  there's 
something  wrong,  by  Jove !  or  he'd  have  turned 
up  before  now,"  Mr.  Chester  replied.  On  which 
Lady  Villars  nodded  her  fair  little  head  and 
threw  up  her  short  nose,  and  said — 

"  Yes — low  connection  I  believe ;  misfortune 
he  has  been  to  his  family;  I  never  did  like 
him."  Hearing  which  Fred  Chester  became  de- 
pressed as  usual  when  he  had  nothing  further 
to  say  on  a  topic. 

There  were  those  extant  who  said  that  in 
days  gone-by  Lady  Villars  had  not  disliked  the 
younger  brother.  But  she  had  always  been  a 
prudent  girl ;  so,  when  he  passed  her  by  heed- 
lessly, and  the  elder  brother  proposed,  she  took 
to  seeing  Stanley's  faults,  and  cured  herself,  as 
was  wise  -and  well. 

So  when  Florence  asked  her  betrothed  "if 
she  mightn't  go  and  see  her  brother  now  ?"  he 
cast  her  down  into  the  depths  by  replying — 

"  Well,  I  think  not  yet,  Flo ;  it  will  be  bette 
to  wait — to  wait  a  little,  you  know." 

"  But  waiting  only  widens  the  distance  be 
tween  us.  Just  fancy  what  he'll  feel  if  he  hear; 
from  any  one  else  that  I  am  going  to  be  mar- 
ried!" Florence  said,  pleadingly. 

"It  will  be  all  right  by-and-by,"  Fred  said, 
in  a  down-hearted  way,  that  belied  his  words. 
He  could  not  bear  the  Stanley  Villars  question, 
for  the  simple  reason  that  it  was  made  a  vexed 
one  between  his  paragon  Lady  Villars,  and  his 
future  bride.  Had  Carrie  not  put  her  veto  upon 
it,  he  would  have  drifted  away  amiably  into 
the  most  distasteful  purlieus  of  our  great  metro- 
polis in  search  of  Stanley,  had  Florence  ordered 
him  to  do  so.  As  it  was,  straight  sailing  ap- 
peared impossible,  and  he  was  not  gifted  with 
the  tacking  mind. 

"That's  what  Gerald  and  Carrie  always  say," 
Florence  replied,  mournfully.  "All  right  by- 
and  by !  They  have  tried  to  comfort  me  with 
that  assurance  for  months!" 

"They  know  best,  you  see,"  Fred  Chester 
said,  persuasively,  looking  at  her  with  the  clear, 
large,  well-shaped,  blue  eyes,  that  were  so  per- 
fect in  form  and  deficient  in  expression— in  the 
expression  of  that  sympathy  which  she  craved. 

"I  had  so  set  my  heart  on  seeing  him 
now,  and  introducing  you  to  him !"  Florence 
said,  trying  to  feel  that  warmth  of  interest  in 
Fred  which  the  latter  part  of  his  sentence  im 
plied. 

"Oh,  you'll  see  him  by-and-by,  Flo;  but  at 
present  they  must  be  careful,  you  know,  and 
try  to  guard  you  from  the  least  thing — that  isn't 
quite  — you  know " 


ON  GUARD. 


127 


"That's  one  of  Carrie's  sentiments,"  Florence 
cried,  with  a  sudden  flash  of  spirit.  Patiently 
had  she  suffered  herself  to  be  dictated  to  by 
Carrie  the  dictatorial ;  but  she  could  not  suffer 
it  patiently  from  the  man  who  was  to  be  her 
husband.  "  That's  one  of  Carrie's  sentiments," 
she  said,  almost  fiercely.  I  believe  that  there 
is  nothing  sweeter,  softer,  more  gentle,  lovable, 
and  harmonious  in  humanity,  than  one  of  these 
richly-coloured  women,  with  golden  brown  hair, 
and  luscious,  melting,  tawny  eyes,  like  a  setter's. 
But  they  can  develop  determination  and  spirit — 
ay,  and  even  angry  resentment,  when  tried  too 
far. 

It  was  trying  her  too  far  now.  Florence  felt, 
that  it  was,  as  she  reflected  on  how  her  husband 
was  to  be  made  the  instrument  of  her  more 
complete  separation  from  her  brother.  She 
could  not  be  patient  any  logger.  This  was 
such  a  low  form  for  rightful  authority  to  take. 

"Carrie  is  generally  right,"  the  lover  said, 
somewhat  abjectly.  He  cared  very  much  for 
Florence,  but  he  could  not  forget  that  Lady 
Villars  had  had  a  habit  of  ordering  him  about, 
and  regulating  his  opinions  for  many  years. 

"  But  you  can  judge  for  yourself,  Fred.  Say 
now — do  you  think  it  right  that  I  should  fall  off 
from  my  own  darling  brother  because  other 
friends  fell  off  from  him  when  his  fortunes 
failed  1"  She  asked  it  earnestly  of  him,  laying 
her  white  hand  on  his  arm  as  she  spoke,  and 
Fred  Chester  began  to  think  that  there  was 
something  in  that  view  of  the  case,  by  Jove ! — 
but  for  all  that  conviction,  to  wish  that  Lady 
Villars  would  come  in  and  help  him  out  of  this 
difficulty  I 

"  Yes ;  I  can  judge  for  myself,"  he  said, 
with  a  small,  self-satisfied  air,  that  was  too 
little  for  his  person^  and  too  big  for  his  mind. 
"I  can  judge  for  myself,  Flo — any  man  can  do 
that!" 

"  Any  man  should  do  it,"  she  said,  quickly. 
"  Come  now — a  bargain,  Fred !  In  every  other 
matter  I  will  be  guided  entirely  by  you ;  but  let 
my  heart  guide  you  in  this;  let  me  see  my, 
brother — not  once  or  twice,  but  always — freely 
as  a  sister  should  see  her  brother — if  you  love 
me?" 

The  handsome  young  man  with  the  beautiful 
eyes  was  embarrassed.  Willingly,  with  all  his 
heart  and  soul,  would  he  have  made  this  com- 
pact with  "  Flo"  had  not  Carrie  loomed  before 
him — an  avenging  spirit,  prone  to  be  down 
upon  any  weakness  committed  by  other  than 
herself.  He  felt  like  a  booby,  and  he  looked 
like  a  booby,  as  he  sat  silent  in  his  embarrass- 
ment. I  think  Florence  would  have  done  more 
wisely  had  she  resolved  upon  steering  her  own 
bark. 

"We'll  talk  about  it  another  time,  Flo,"  he 
pleaded  presently.  "  You  don't  know,  you  see, 
and  I  can't  tell  you,  you  see ;  but  Carrie  seems 
to  think  that  you  had  better  let  things  rest  for 
a  time." 

"  And  if  I  let  them  'rest '  now,  will  you  do 
what  I  ask  by-and-by  ?"  she  cried. 

"Yes — oh,  of  course,  dear!"  and  then  he 
kissed  Florence,  and  she  shrank  and  shuddered 
as  his  lips  touched  her  brow,  and  tried  to  make 
herself  believe  that  she  only  did  so  because 
these  kisses  were  such  very  new  things. 

Lady  Villars  got  hold  of  "him  before  he  quit- 


ted  the  house  after  that  interview  with  Florence. 
The  gentle  Carrie  sent  for  him  to  her  own  little 
sitting-room,  with  the  friendly  design  of  making 
him  feel  what  a  delightful  woman  she  was  her- 
self to  have  for  a  confidante,  and  of  strengthen- 
ing the  purpose  Florence  might  have  under- 
mined. 

"  You  can  sit  there,  Fred,"  she  said,  pointing 
to  a  low  stool,  a  seat  on  which  brought  the  oc- 
cupier to  a  level  with  her  feet ;  "  you  can  sit 
there,  Fred ;  and  you  shall  have  some  tea  with 
me,  won't  you  ?" 

"No;  I  don't  want  the  tea,"  he  said,  taking 
the  seat  she  indicated,  and  bringing  his  beauti- 
ful eyes  to  bear  upon  her  without  the  slightest 
meaning  in  them ;  "  but  I  want  to  talk  to  you — 
you're  such  a  sensible  woman,  and  can  tell  a 
fellow  what  he  ought  to  do.  There's  Flo  got  it 
into  her  head  that  she  ought  to  run  after  her 
brother  Stanley,  you  know ;  and  I  don't  care, 
you  know,  only " 

"  Only,  of  course,  you  wouldn't— you  couldn't 
allow  her  to  do  it.  Oh,  no !  I  quite  see  your 
objections,"  Lady  Villars  interrupted,  sweetly. 

"  No :  you — see — the  fact  is,  I  was  thinking 
that  you  could  put  it  to  her,  you  know,  if  it  had 
better  not  be,  you  see — at  least,  not  now." 

"  Certainly  not  now,  Fred ;  your  wife  com- 
promise herself  by  mixing  herself  up  with  that 
young  profligate's  low  intrigue !"  Lady  Villars' 
voice  almost  fizzed  as  she  said  "  profligate ;"  it 
was  so  nice  to  apply  this  term  to  the  man  who 
had  passed  her  over. 

"  That  would  be  rather  out  of  the  way,  by 
Jove !  But  I  don't  think  she  quite  wanted 
that,"  Fred  Chester  remarked,  meditatively. 

"  Oh,  she  doesn't  know  what  she  wants — dear 
girl !"  Carrie  said,  with  a  plain  snap,  the  epithet 
coming  in  as  an  ornamental  after-thought. 
"Florence  is  very  young,  you  know,  and  we 
must  guard  her,  since  she  is  incapable ;  in  fact, 
it  isn't  to  be  desired  that  she  should  be  alive  to 
all  the  danger;  but  then,  toe  know." 

"To  be  sure  we  know!"  Fred  Chester  re- 
plied, with  a  sapient  air,  that  was  refreshing 
to  behold,  if  you  were  not  going  to  be  allied 
to  him. 

"If  you  took  my  advice,"  Lady  Villars  went 
on,  in  a  sweet,  small  voice,  "it  may  not  be 
worth  much — but  it's  well  meant " 

She  paused,  and  Fred  took  the  opportunity 
of  observing  that  he  knew  its  value  as  well  as 
any  fellow ;  that  he  really  would  take  it  (and 
so  would  Florence)  gladly. 

"  Then,  if  you  really  care  for  my  poor  opi- 
nion," Lady  Villars  resumed,  sweetly,  "I  should 
say,  keep  our  dear  Florence  away  from  Stan- 
ley's influence.  It  would  be  ridiculous  to  affect 
before  you  anything  but  a  full  knowledge  of  the 
brilliant — yes,  brilliant  future  that  awaits  our 
darling."  (Lady  Villars  grew  as  tenderly  tear- 
ful at  this  point  as  regard  for  the  hue  of  her 
short  nose,  which  was  apt  to  become  inflamed, 
would  permit.)  "It  would  also  be  unfair  to 
you  not  to  tell  you  that  Florence's  tendency  to 
generosity  amounts  to  weakness — positive  weak- 
ness ! — and  to  warn  you  that  it  may  be  played 
upon  to  your  cost  by  those  who  have  influence 
over  her." 

Fred  Chester  felt  himself  to  be  a  mark  for 
foul  designs,  all  of  a  mercenary  order,  on  the 
spot.  Of  course  he  was  much  too  sharp  to  be 


128 


ON  GUARD. 


taken  in — he  had  that  satisfactory  self-assur- 
ance! But  he  would  show  Florence  that  he 
was  the  master,  and  that  he  was  not  disposed 
to  lavish  his  red,  red  gold  on  unworthy  objects ! 

He  made  this  intention  clear  to  Lady  Yillars, 
sitting  at  that  sensible  matron's  feet,  in  the  soli- 
tude of  her  little  room,  and  looking  at  her  with 
his  beautiful  eyes,  in  which  was  no  dangerous 
meaning.  When  he  had  done  that,  Lady  Yil- 
lars  sent  him  away;  he  was  apt  to  become 
tedious  after  ten  minutes,  for  all  his  good  looks, 
if  the  truth  be  told. 

If  the  truth  be  told  about  all  things,  too,  it 
must  be  admitted  that  Florence  had  made  a 
mistake — a  second  mistake — and  a  far  larger 
one  than  that  she  had  made  about  Claude  Wal- 
singham.  It  was  only  her  heart  that  had  been 
deceived  in  her  intercourse  with  the  man  who 
had  been  in  action  and  come  out  scatheless 
dozens  of  times,  only  to  fall  at  last  before  Bella 
Yane !  It  was  only  her  heart  that  had  led  her 
astray  then.  But  now  her  head,  her  judgment, 
her  knowledge  of  a  by  no  means  profound  cha- 
racter, were  all  at  fault.  The  wish — the  hope 
that  he  would  go  hand  in  hand  with  her  about 
Stanley  was  father  to  the  thought  and  belief 
that  he  would  do  so ;  and  now  that  she  had 
gone  too  far  to  recede — now  that  she  had 
pledged  herself,  and  made  herself  believe  that 
she  loved  him — now  that  her  sister-in-law  had 
lavished  sums  at  Marshall  and  Snelgrove's,  and 
held  countless  consultations  with  Elise,  and  told 
everybody  "  what  a  delightful  match  it  was — 
quite  a  marriage  of  affection  " — now  she  disco- 
vered that,  as  Mrs.  Chester,  she  would  be  as  far 
from  Stanley  as  she  was  at  present  I  There 
would  be  a  double  guard  over  her  to  save  her 
from  the  imaginary  harm. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX. 

"THOSE  ROSES!" 

"WE  left  Stanley  Yillars,  and  the  poor,  pretty, 
helpless  little  girl  whom  he  had  married,  to  his 
own  immediate  cost  and  her  ultimate  sorrow,  in 
a  very  evil  case.  Things  had  come  to  a  very 
terrible  pass  with  him  on  that  August  day  when 
last  we  looked  upon  him.  Now,  a  little  later  in 
the  month,  there  was  a  ray  of  hope  lighting  up 
even  his  dim,  dull,  dark  path. 

It  did  not  radiate  from  Florence.  Had  that 
once  cherished  sister  realised  how  sadly  he  sick- 
ened for  her  whenever  he  did  think  of  aught 
beyond  the  murky,  miserable  present,  she  would 
surely  have  burst  the  rotten  chains  they  loaded 
her  with  for  safety's  sake,  and  have  gone  to  him, 
and  essayed  to  offer  him  such  comfort  as  could 
still  be  shed  upon  that  wasted,  misused  mind  of 
his.  Had  she  known  him  as  he  was,  lying 
there,  day  after  day,  in  poverty,  peevishness, 
and  almost  solitude,  she  would — she  must  have 
got  herself  together,  for  the  leap  that  should 
carry  her  free  of  all  the  prejudices  that  held  her 
from  him. 

Late  on  the  night  of  that  day  when  we  looked 
upon  them  last,  Stanley  Yillars  made  a  solemn 
request  Of  his  wife.  "  Promise  me  one  thing, 
pet,"  he  said — he  had  grown  strangely  fond  of 
and  tender  to  her  since  he  had  begun  to  fear 


what  was  coming  upon  her  in  her  youth  through 
him — "  Promise  me  one  thing,  pet." 

"Anything  you  ask  me,  Stanley,"  she  said, 
with  a  little  tremble. 

"  You'll  never,  let  what  will  come,  make  any 
appeal  to  my  family.  God !  I  couldn't  stand 
that!"  He  asked  it  almost  fiercely,  and  she 
shook  as  she  answered — 

"Never!" 

"  They — I  don't  blame  them,  mind — but  they 
don't  want  to  have  more  to  do  with  me ;  and  I 
won't  have  them  refuse  you  anything,  poor 
child,"  he  went  on  bitterly. 

"  Your  sister  Florence  was  very  fond  of  you, 
wasn't  she  ?"  Marian  asked,  with  a  little,  fever- 
ish feminine  desire  to  hear  something  about  the 
mighty  family  into  which  she  had  married — the 
family  who  utterly  scouted  her. 

"  She  was  fond  of  me,  poor  Florence  1  but 
that's  past  evidently." 

"  How  ? — why  do  you  say  so  ?" 

"I  have  written  to  her,  and  had  no  answer," 
he  said  with  a  sob.  "  There,  let's  have  done 
with  the  subject.  It's  the  hardest  thing  of  all 
that  they  should  have  turned  that  loving  child 
from  me  utterly.  Swear  to  me  by  your  soul, 
Marian,  that  you'll  make  no  appeal — take  no- 
thing from  one  of  them — come  what  may !" 

He  was  almost  choked  by  the  emotion  with 
which  he  asked  it.  She  hastened  eagerly  to 
give  him  the  assurance  he  sought. 

This  conversation  had  taken  place  on  the 
night  of  that  day  when  Marian  had  sauntered 
out  with  Rock  and  seen  Bella.  When  we  see 
them  again,  a  week  or  ten  days  later,  things 
looked  a  little  brighter. 

Stanley's  novel — the  one  he  had  been  run- 
ning through  the  magazine — had  come  out,  and 
reviewers  had  been  generous,  as  it  decidedly  is 
the  wont  of  the  majority  to  be  when  aught  like 
merit  can  be  discerned.  He  was  very  weakly, 
and  worn,  and  weary,  in  these  days ;  but  Bligh, 
the  kindly,  hard-working  young  fellow,  who 
was  stopping  the  gap,  and  keeping  his  place  on 
the  paper  open  for  him,  used  to  "  look  in  "  daily, 
if  only  for  a  minute  or  two,  and  bring  him  the 
notices,  and  tell  him  how  things  were  going. 

He  was  very  weakly,  and  worn,  and  weary, 
in  these  days;  so  weak  that  the  exertion  of 
reading  a  favourable  review,  and  the  flash  of 
hope  the  same  would  cause  him,  would  be 
almost  too  much  for  him ;  so  weak  that  he  put 
a  power  of  faith  in  the  prospect  others  seemed 
to  think  was  in  store  for  him,  for  the  non-com- 
mittal assertion  that  his  "  work  was  full  of 
great  promise  "  was  liberally  indulged  in.  There 
was  plenty  in  store  for  the  future,  he  began  to 
tell  himself,  and  not  absolute  want  in  the  pre- 
sent ;  for  his  salary  came  to  him  as  usual  from 
the  daily  journal  for  which  he  did  not  write,  and 
Marian  was  always  going  out  brightly  to  make 
purchases,  and  coming  in  brighter  than  she 
went  out. 

She  was  such  a  loving  wife  to  him,  such  a 
patient,  tender  little  nurse,  that,  he  might  well 
feel  it  to  be  a  cause  for  thankfulness  that  he  had 
married  her.  So  the  days  drew  on  to  the  close 
of  August,  and  that  reeling  of  the  brain  went 
on  more  wildly  than  before. 

One  morning  when  she  had  got  him  up,  and 
helped  him  down-stairs  (the  once  strong  erect 
man  stooped  now,  and  leant  heavily  on  the 


ON  GUARD. 


129 


slight  arm  and  rounded  shoulder  of  the  lithe 
young  girl  whose  slender  form  had  shown  off 
mantles  and  shawls  so  well),  she  knelt  down  by 
the  side  of  his  couch,  and  told  him  she  had 
made  a  friend— such  a  nice  one,  and  her  friend 
was  coming  to  see  him  to-day. 

She  told  him  this  with  dancing  eyes  and  other 
signs  of  animation,  and  he  tried  so  feebly  now 
to  respond,  because  of  the  deep  pity  he  had  for 
this  girl  who  had  none  now  for  herself.  Still, 
with  a  hazy  recollection  floating  about  in  his 
mind  of  Miss  Simpson,  the  model  milliner,  who 
was  looming  over  him,  he  could  not  succeed  in 
responding  to  Marian's  communication  with 
anything  like  the  degree  of  warmth  with  which 
it  was  made. 

"  Your  friend  mustn't  mind  my  keeping  my 
face  to  the  back  of  the  sofa,  Marian? — I  can't 
he  bored — I  can't  manage  any  talking  till  Bligh 
comes  at  night  to  tell  me  how  things  are  going, 
and  hear  whether  I  can  get  into  harness  again 
to-morrow." 

Bligh  never  omitted  this  formula,  though  no 
one  knew  better  than  he  that  Stanley  Villars 
would  never  get  into  harness  again — that  he 
was  one  more  added  to  the  long  list  of  those 
who  have  broken  down. 

"  Perhaps  you'll  care  to  talk  when  you  see 
her,"  Marian  said,  softly.  And  when  she  said 
that,  a  gnawing  desire  to  ask  "  Was  it  Florence  ?" 
seized  the  failing  man. 

But  he  would  not  ask  it — partly  because  he 
would  not  put  the  idea  of  its  being  possible  that 
she  should  come  in  Marian's  head,  and  partly 
because  he  shrank  from  hearing  an  answer  in 
the  negative.  He  knew  that  he  should  wince 
and  shrink  did  such  answer  smite  him.  He 
was  so  weak,  so  uncertain  of  himself,  that  he 
dared  not  risk  a  blow,  though  more  than  half 
prepared  for  it. 

So  he  curbed  the  gnawing  desire,  and  re- 
mained quiet  with  his  face  to  the  wall,  with  a 
-cold  dew  of  expectation  on  his  brow,  and  a 
panting  eagerness  in  his  heart.  Sternly  as  he 
had  forbidden  Florence  to  be  sought,  he  was 
more  than  rejoiced  that  at  last,  though  late,  she 
was  seeking  him. 

Marian  busied  herself  about  the  room,  trying 
to  give  it  an  air  of  brightness  and  cheerfulness, 
and  failing  by  reason  of  there  being  nothing 
bright  and  cheerful  in  it.  Dusting  his  books 
and  papers,  and  fidgeting  him  wofully  by  the 
rustle  she  made,  and  the  disarray  she  would  be 
safe  to  introduce  amongst  his  slips.  Endeavour- 
ing to  give  the  scanty  curtains  a  graceful  sweep 
and  fall,  which  they  could  not  achieve.  Polish- 
ing up  the  surface  of  her  little  work-table  till 
all  the  reels  of  cotton  danced  aloud  within  it, 
making  Stanley's  head  stab,  and  causing  him 
to  curse  this  suddenly-developed  domesticity. 
Flashing  hither  and  thither  in  the  room,  and 
being  very  energetic  and  busy  altogether. 

By-and-by  she  went  out  of  the  room,  and  pre- 
sently returned  with  a  tall  vase  of  roses — red 
and  white  roses — not  overblown,  and  most 
delicately  scented;  autumnal  roses,  that  had 
been  born  of  the  late  summer  sun,  and  had  the 
fervour  of  it  upon  them. 

Weak  as  he  was,  languid  as  he  was,  heart- 
sick as,  heaven  knows,  he  had  good  cause  to  be, 
he  quickened  at  the  sight  and  scent  of  them,  and 
his  old  love  for  the  beautiful  sparkled  up  in  the 
9 


dull  eyes  that  so  seldom  saw  cause  for  sparkling 
now.  It  was  the  first  time  Marian  had  ever 
brought  him  flowers;  and  from  him,  needing 
essentials  as  he  so  often  did,  a  request  for  such 
frail  luxuries  would  have  come  strangely. 

But  now  that  he  had  them — now,  that  she 
of  her  own  free  will  had  brought  them  to  him 
— he  let  her  see  how  he  loved  them,  and  she 
revelled  in  the  sight.  They  were  such  dainty 
flowers !  —  deep  crimson  and  creamy  white. 
He  would  have  them  on  her  work-stand,  close 
by  his  side,  where  his  hand  could  rest  caress- 
ingly on  the  vase  that  held  them ;  where  their 
perfume  could  reach  him,  bathing  him  in  an 
atmosphere  that  brought  back  the  vision  of 
that  rose- embowered  window  which  had  been 
Bella's  shrine  in  the  halcyon  days  of  his  adora 
tion  for  her.  There  was  something  so  grace- 
ful, refined,  and  elevating  about  those  roses, 
that  he  felt  more  like  a  gentleman — more  like 
his  old  self — than  he  had  done  for  many 
months. 

"I  feel  better  already  for  the  flowers,"  he 
said,  calling  her  over  to  him,  when  she  had  done 
all  she  could  do  to  the  room,  and  was  pausing 
to  look  at  the  effect  of  her  labours ;  and  finding 
the  "all"  very  insufficient  —  "I  feel  better 
already  for  the  flowers.  What  good  taste  it 
was  to  get  all  roses,  dear."  • 

She  blushed,  and  smiled,  and  looked  pleased.  ' 

"Ain't  they  lovely  and  expensive?"  she 
asked,  simply. 

"Expensive!  are  they?"  with  a  sigh  of  dis- 
appointment. "Ah!  I  never  thought  of  that ; 
poor  child,  you  shouldn't  have  got  them  for 
me!" 

"  They  were  given,"  she  explained,  opening 
her  eyes  like  stars.     "  Here,  Rock !  get  up," 
she  called  to  the  dog.     "  He  shall  have  one  in  ' 
his  collar,  Stanley,"  she  continued. 

"Given,  were  they?  by  whom?-  No,  I 
won't  have  one  wasted  on  the  dog !  they  must 
last  me  for  so  long." 

He  spoke  peevishly,  petulantly,  as  a  sick 
child  might  have  done.  He  did  not  like  to 
hear  that  the  rare  flowers  had  been  given  to 
his  wife.  And  yet  he  could  not  part  with 
them — they  were  too  sweet  and  dear.  ' 

"When  they're  dead  you  shall  have  some 
more.  Do  let  me  put  one  in  Rock's  collar !" 

He  took  hold  of  her  hand  in  his  own  almost 
transparent  one. 

"  You  must  not  accept    presents,   Marian, 

from "    He  stopped,  and  she  asked,  "  Why 

not  ?" 

"  Don't  bother  about  the  dog.  Who  gave 
them  to  you  ?" 

She  put  the  rose  she  had  taken  out  back  into 
the  vase,  and  replied — 

"  That's  a  secret !  You'll  know  by-and-by, 
but  it's  a  secret  now  1" 

Then  he  looked  at  her  small,  pure  face,  aud 
never  doubted  but  that  it  was  a  "  secret " 
which  she  might  indulge  herself  in  with  per- 
fect safety  to  them  both.  Perchance,  even,  the 
flowers  that  were  so  sweet  to  him  were  from 
Florence. 

As  the  hours  passed,  Marian  grew  very 
watchful  and  uneasy,  and  he  saw  that  she 
was  getting  anxious  about  her  expected  visi- 
tor. She  kept  on  going  to  the  window  and 
looking  out  eagerly ;  and  she  made  Rock  stand 


130 


ON  GUARD. 


up,  with  his  large  white  paws  on  the  sill,  in 
order  that  he  might  sight  the  arrival  at  once, 
and  give  notice  by  one  of  his  deep,  rolling 
barks. 

Presently  the  notice  was  given.  There  was 
a  sound  of  wheels;  then  an  angry  bark  from 
Rock,  which  was  quickly  changed  into  a  joy- 
ous one,  as"  he  caught  sight  of  some  one  com- 
ing up  the  steps.  The  red  setter  rushed  round 
the  room  in  intense  excitement,  his  white 
feathered  tail  flaunting  like  a  pennon;  and 
some  of  the  dog's  excitement  communicated 
itself  to  the  master.  Poor  Stanley  Villars  was 
too  weak  to  rise,  and  too  nervous  to  remain 
quiescent.  He  could  only  flutter,  as  an  old 
woman  or  a  young  girl  might  have  done. 

Marian  had  rushed  out  to  meet  her  guest; 
and  he  heard  them  speaking  in  the  passage, 
but  they  spoke  in  whispers,  and  he  could  not, 
therefore,  recognise  the  stranger's  tone.  "I 
shall  die  the  happier  for  having  seen  Florry," 
he  thought.  Then  a  sob,  that  he  could  not 
check,  sent  the  burning  tears,  that  he  would 
have  given  all  he  had  not  to  shed,  rushing 
from  his  eyes.  Involuntarily,  as  the  door 
opened,  he  clasped  his  hands  over  his  face,  in 
order  that  his  sister  should  not  see  the  change 
that  he  knew  too  well  was  upon  him.  There 
was  a  quick  movement,  as  of  rustling  skirts, 
through  the  room,  and  a  light  hand  was  laid 
on  his.  He  uncovered  his  eyes  then,  and  look- 
ing up,  saw  a  beautiful  face,  burning  with  emo- 
tion, and  trembling  with  passionate  helpless 
pity,  bending  over  him,  and  a  slight  hand  try- 
ing to  repulse  the  rough  caresses  of  the  dog. 
And  the  face  was  not  that  of  his  sister  Florence, 
but  of  her  who  had  been  Bella  Yane. 


CHAPTER   XL. 

MAKING  A  BOOK. 

LEAVING  Bella  to  gaze  undisturbed  with  no 
very  enviable  feelings  on  the  form  of  the  man 
whose  downfall  had  dated  from  the  day  he 
learnt  that  she  was  false  as  she  was  fair ;  leav- 
ing that  man  in  a  maze  of  bewilderment  as  to 
how  she  came  near  him  now — how  this  miracle 
came  to  pass,  that  she,  his  old  love,  should  be 
his  wife's  new  friend ;  leaving  that  poor  little 
wife  panting,  partly  with  hope  and  partly  with 
fear,  for  the  result  of  this  combination  which 
she  had  effected — I  will  go  back  a  few  steps, 
and  strive  to  make  clear  to  my  readers  the  maze 
through  which  Mrs.  Claude  had  come  to  the 
meeting. 

A  day  or  two  after  that  encounter  with  Marian 
and  Rock  in  the  park,  Major  Walsiugham  had 
been  summoned  to  "  the  Court."  His  father 
was  very  ill,  and  he,  the  heir,  was  needed.  Be- 
fore he  went  he  said  to  his  wife — 

"By  the  way,  Lady  Lexley  has  been  ill, 
Bella:  I  wish  you  would  call  and  enquire  for 
her." 

"  I  will,  if  I  am  going  that  way,"  Bella  re- 
plied coldly.  She  could  not  conquer  her  dislike 
to  Lady  Lexley,  and  she  felt  annoyed  with 
Claude  for  thrusting  her  into  communion  with 
that  lady,  to  say  nothing  of  feeling  annoyed 
with  herself  for  entertaining  the  dislike. 


"Certainly,  don't  go  out  of  your  way  to  do 
it,"  he  replied  carelessly;  "that  wouldn't  be 
well,  in  fact ;  but  there's  no  harm  in  being  civil 
to  her,  since  every  one  else  is."  With  which 
rather  sketchy  rule  for  her  safe  conduct,  he  left 
his  wife  and  went  down  to  "the  Court." 

Two  days  after  his  departure  she  received  a 
letter  from  Claude,  containing  a  request  to  which 
she  had  no  inclination  to  accede,  and  which  she 
had  no  reason  for  refusing.  "  My  mother  tells 
me  that  Grace  Harper  wants  to  go  to  town  for 
a  week  or  two ;  the  aunt  with  whom  she  usually 
stays  (old  Lady  Lexley)  is  in  Wales ;  you  had 
better  invite  her  to  be  your  guest.  By  doing 
so  you'll  oblige  an  old  friend  of  my  family's, 
and  please  my  mother."  Having  written  thus 
much,  he  went  off  into  another  subject — his 
father's  ill-health  namely.  But  later  in  the 
epistle  the  Grace  Harper  topic  came  upon  the 
board  again.  "I  shall  tell  Ellen  to  arrange  for 
you  with  Miss  Grace,  and  one  of  them  will  drop 
you  a  line  to-morrow,  telling  you  what  time  you 
may  expect  her."  Then  he  wound  up  with  ex- 
pressions of  his  unalterable  affection  for  her ;  and 
Bella,  in  the  pleasure  of  perusing  these,  forgot 
her  slight  annoyance  at  Miss  Harper's  expected 
advent. 

"  Besides,  I  rather  like  the  girl,  and  of  course 
Claude's  free  to  ask  whomsoever  he  pleases  to 
the  house.  Only  I  had  such  a  time  of  it  with 
Mrs.  Markham,  that  I  would  have  preferred  a 
longer  respite  from  lady  visitors.  However, 
there's  no  help  for  it." 

There  was  no  help  for  it.  The  day  after  a 
kindly-worded  letter  from  Grace  arrived,  thank- 
ing Bella  for  her  "  kind  consideration  in  wishing 
to  have  her  (Grace),"  and  utterly  ignoring 
Claude's  share  in  the  arrangement.  "  Deal 
Claude!  he  has  made  it  seem  to  be  entirely  my 
own  idea.  I  suppose  he  really  does  want  the 
people  down  there  to  like  me  very  much,"  she 
said  to  herself,  as  she  laid  the  letter  down ; 
"but  why  didn't  she  go  to  Lady  Lexley's,  I 
wonder?" 

Miss  Harper,  and  her  maid  and  her  man, 
arrived  in  the  course  of  the  following  day.  She 
was  far  too  precious  a  thing  to  have  been  en- 
trusted to  the  tender  mercies  of  the  railway 
company  without  these  adjuncts.  She  arrived, 
and  her  young  hostess  made  her  frankly  wel- 
come, and  even  asked  after  "  her  friend  Mrs. 
Markham"  with  something  like  interest. 

"  For,  though  she's  Claude's  sister,  I  always 
feel  that  you're  much  more  intimate  with  her 
than  I  am,"  Bella  explained,  on  Grace  making 
large  eyes  at  the  question. 

"Don't  you  write  to  each  other?"  Grace 
asked. 

"No,  never." 

"How  odd  1  At  least  I  suppose  it's  antipa- 
thy. Do  you  know,"  she  said,  with  a  well-af- 
fected effort,  "  I  have  the  same  feeling  against 
my  cousin's  wife." 

Bella  blushed :  so  had  she  the  same  feeling, 
only  she  was  half-ashamed  of  it. 

"It  all  comes,  in  the  case  of  Lady  Lexley," 
Miss  Harper  went  on,  "  of  her  having  been  pro- 
fessional. There  are  sure  to  be  rumours,  you 
know  ;  but  it's  unchristian  to  regard  them." 

"  Do  you  know  anything  against  Lady  Lex- 
ley  ?"  Bella  asked  eagerly. 

"  Oh,  no!  and  don't  let  us  be  the  ones,  deai 


ON  GUARD. 


131 


Mrs.  Walsingham,  to  give  rise  to  scandal,"  Miss 
Harper  said  with  emphasis. 

"Give  rise  to  it!" — all  Bella's  generous  im- 
pulses were  stirred  within  her — "now  do  you 
think  I  could  be  so  base  ?" 

"  No,  I  do  not,"  Miss  Harper  rejoined ;  "  but 
still,  dear,  you  must  promise  never  to  hint  a 
word  that  I  have  said.  I  don't  believe  it  (though 
I'm  not  fond  of  her) ;  it  would  be  cruel  to 
believe  it,  to  act  as  if  we  believed  it." 

"  Believed  what?"  Bella  was  getting  bewil- 
dered. 

"  Why,  that  she  is  not  all  that  a  woman  ought 
to  be.  Oh,  dear,  it's  so  hard  to  flo  right  1  God 
knows  what  is  in  my  heart  I"  Miss  Harper  went 
on,  piously  lowering  her  yellow  eyelashes  over 
her  cheeks  as  she  spoke. 

"  I  don't  wish  not  to  think  her  that,"  Bella 
said  remorsefully.  She  felt  so  sorry  now  that 
she  had  not  been  to  inquire  for  Lady  Lexley. 

"  I  shall  never  forgive  myself  if  you  ever  hint 
that  I  have  spoken  on  the  subject,"  Miss  Grace 
exclaimed ;  M  it  was  so  wrong  of  me  to  speak. 
I  believe  her  to  ,be  as  pure  as  I  am  myself. 
Promise  me  that  you  will  never,  by  either  word 
or  manner,  to  any  one,  let  a  hint  of  this  escape 
you." 

Bella  promised  nervously  and  hurriedly.  "Why 
should  she  be  supposed  to  be  anxious  to  run 
down  an  innocent  woman  ?  She  promised  that 
she  would  not  do  so,  rather  more  fervently  than 
was  perhaps  necessary.  There  was  nothing 
mean  in  the  girl's  nature ;  had  there  been,  she 
would  have  distrusted  this  hedging  on  the  part 
of  Miss  Harper — this  late  circumspection — this 
pious  prudence. 

Almost  immediately  Mrs.  Claude  Walsing- 
ham called  to  inquire  for  Lady  Lexley.  Lady 
Lexley  was  not  at  home.  With  almost  royal 
celerity  Lady  Lexley  returned  the  visit,  and 
Bella  began  to  feel  that  there  was  something 
pleasant  about  the  woman — something  pleasant 
in  the  dramatic  character  of  her  beauty — some- 
thing pleasant  in  her  openly-expressed  admira- 
tion for  Bella  herself 

Grace  was  more  than  friendly  in  her  de- 
meanour to  her  cousin's  wife.  She  was  loving 
and  affectionate  to  a  degree  that  made  Bella 
feel  herself  to  be  but  a  cold  sinner  in  compari- 
son. She  called  Lady  Lexley  "dear,"  and  sat 
on  a  little  stool  at  her  feet.  She  offered  to  do 
all  sorts  of  things  for  Lady  Lexley,  and  then 
disappointed  Lady  Lexley  when  the  time  for 
fulfilment  came,  in  the  most  engaging  man- 
ner. 

Lady  Lexley  knew  something — as  did  the 
majority  of  people  in  their  world— of  Mrs. 
Claude's  former  engagement.  She  had  heard 
it  spoken  of  in  a  hundred  ways,  as  broken  en- 
gagements, to  the  cost  of  those  who  break 
them,  are  ever  spoken  about.  In  her  own  often- 
erring  heart  she  did  full  justice  to  all  that  was 
good,  all  that  was  true,  all  that  was  undesign- 
ing,  in  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham.  She  knew 
Bella  to  be  thoughtless,  careless,  too  quick  to 
feel  and  to  act.  She  also  knew  Bella  to  be 
honest  in  her  impulses,  no  matter  into  what 
evil  those  impulses  led  her ;  and  she  believed 
Mrs.  Claude  to  be  endowed  with  that  sort  of 
generosity  which  risks  its  possessor  very  often, 
and  revolts  at  all  meanness.  "If  she  knew 
what  that  man  was  suffering  she  wouldn't  go 


on  her  way  smiling,"  Lady  Lexley  said  to  her- 
self one  day,  when  she  had  heard  from  the  in- 
defatigable Simpson  the  story  of  "her  (Simp- 
son's) friend  Mrs.  Stanley  Villars'  sorrows." 
"  The  man  has  cut  his  own  throat,  of  course  ; 
but  that  child  will  feel  that  she  put  the  knife  in 
his  way,  and  will  bless  any  one  who'll  help  her 
to  heal  the  wound." 

Fraught  with  this  idea,  she  speedily  made  an 
opportunity  of  telling  Mrs.  Claude  all  she  knew ; 
and  then  Mrs.  Claude  confided  to  her  in  turn 
how  she  had  "  heard  Stanley  Villars  had  a  wife, 
and  how  she  had  disbelieved  it." 

"  But  it's  true  for  all  that,"  Lady  Lexley  re- 
.plied ;  "  the  girl  he  has  married  isn't  a  lady,  but 
she's  honest  and  pure;  help  to  keep  her  so, 
Mrs.  Walsingham,  for  they're  in  horrible  dis- 
tress." 

"I  will  tell  Claude  the  instant  he  comes 
home,"  Bella  replied ;  "  how  he'll  feel  it,  poor 
boy!"  In  the  midst  of  her  own  grief  for  the 
evil  that  had  come  upon  Stanley  Yillars,  her 
greatest  sorrow  was  for  the  grief  of  the  man  she 
loved.  "  How  he'll  feel  it,  poor  boy !"  she  half 
sobbed. 

"  Yes,  it's  very  hard  to  see  one  who  has  been 
swimming  with  us  go  to  the  bottom,"  Lady 
Lexley  replied ;  "  but  you  may  as  well  see  his 
wife,  as  you  and  Major  Walsingham  were  such 
old  friends  of  her  husband's.  Nearly  every  one 
gets  spoken  about  in  this  world ;  but  there's  not 
a  breath  against  that  poor  child  Mr.  Villars 
married.  It's  pitiable,"  Lady  Lexley  continued, 
waxing  warm,  "to  see  her  sauntering  about  in 
the  park  by  herself,  because  she's  weary  of  the 
streets,  and  needs  air.  See  her,  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham, and  see  her  soon." 

"  When  Claude  comes  home,"  Bella  said. 

"  When  will  he  come  ?  The  man  is  dying,  1 
tell  you.  Write  to  your  husband  about  it." 

But  from  this  Bella  most  unwisely  shrank. 
"I  can  tell  him  everything  in  two  minutes — 
how  I  heard  of  it  and  all ;  but  to  write,  it  is 
different.  Claude  is  so  fastidious ;  I  should 
like  to  see  her  soon,  though ;  and  to  help  them, 
if  I  could." 

"I  tell  you  how  you  can  manage,  then," 
Lady  Lexley  replied,  eagerly;  "come  to  lun- 
cheon with  me.  Ah!  there's  Grace.  Well, 
bring  her,  and  come  to  luncheon  with  me  to- 
morrow ;  then  we'll  go  to  the  shop  where  she 
used  to  be,  and  Miss  Simpson  can  tell  you  her 
address ;  something  must  be  done,  and  done 
quickly — the  man  is  dying." 

Bella  blenched. 

"But  what  can  /do?" 

"  See  them  for  yourself,  and  then  let  his  fa 
mily  know.  Had  /  the  right  of  old  friendship 
which  you  have,  wouldn't  I  do  it,  think  you ! 
It's  hideous,  to  think  about,  even  to  me,  who 
only  knew  Mr.  Villars  by  name  and  repute." 
She  stopped,  breathless  with  genuine  horror  at 
that  fate  which  had  befallen  Stanley — a  fate 
she,  better  than  Bella,  could  realise. 

"  Then  it  shall  be  so.  How  could  I  ever 
have  hesitated  ?"  Bella  said,  with  tears  in  her 
eyes.  "  It's  all  I  can  do  to  go  and  see  him — 
them,  I  mean — and  show  him  that  my  friend- 
ship is  unaltered." 

"  Of  course  it's  all  you  can  do — till  your 
husband  comes  back ;  but  do  it  without  delay, 
for  heaven's  sake !"  Lady  Lexley  cried,  ener- 


132 


ON  GUARD. 


getically.  "Come  to  me  to-morrow^  and  I'll 
put  you  in  the  way  of  doing  it." 

On  the  morrow,  shortly  after  Mrs.  Claude  had 
mooted  the  subject  of  going  out  to  Lady  Lex- 
ley's  to  her  companion,  Miss  Harper  was  seized 
with  a  violent  headache.  "  Would  dear  Mrs. 
Claude  go  without  her,  and  give  her  best  love 
and  a  thousand  apologies  for  her  non-appear- 
ance, to  Adele  ?"  Mrs.  Claude  would,  but  still 
regretted  very  much  that  Grace  should  fail  her. 

"  I  don't  like  to  leave  you,  as  you  are  so  ill, 
Grace,"  she  said. 

"  Oh,  my  dear,  for  you  not  to  go  would  be  a 
dreadful  slight  to  Lady  Lexley.  Poor  thing ! 
why  should  you  wish  to  hurt  her?  Do  go,  and 
be  kind  to  her ;  you  see  she  lost  her  old  friends 
by  her  marriage,  and  hasn't  made  many  new 
ones  since." 

.  "Kind  to  her;  it's  no  question  of  kindness  or 
unkindness,"  Bella  exclaimed.  She  began  to 
fear  that  she  must  have  a  most  uncharitable  dis- 
position, and  that  Miss  Harper  had  detected  the 
same,  and  was  trying  to  guard  her  from  its  ill 
effects,  and  to  re-mould  it  as  became  a  Chris- 
tian. 

"  Then,  do  be  careful.  Pray,  be  very  care- 
ful," Miss  Harper  replied.  And  Bella,  not  feel- 
ing at  all  sure  as  to  what  she  was  to  be  careful 
of,  went  off  with  a  confusion  in  her  brain. 

"Went  off,  and  partook  of  the  aforesaid  lun- 
cheon with  Lady  Lexley,  and  then  ordered  her 
carriage  round,  and  asked  for  the  address  of  the 
shop  at  which  Mrs..  Stanley  Yillars  was  to  be 
"  heard  about." 

"  But  I'll  go  with  you,  if  you  will  allow  me ; 
we  shall  see  her  there,"  Lady  Lexley  said,  fix- 
ing her  eyes  on  Mrs.  Claude's.  On  which  Mrs. 
Claude  felt  confused  as  to  something,  she  knew 
not  what,  and  replied,  "  Oh,  certainly ;  most 
happy." 

But  she  was  not  happy,  and  she  taxed  her 
mind  to  the  utmost  to  supply  herself  with  a 
valid  reason  for  being  otherwise.  She  had 
given  her  jealousy  of  Lady  Lexley  to  the  winds, 
and  Lady  Lexley  had  lately  been  showing  a 
very  womanly  and  generous  desire  to  put  her 
(Bella)  in  the  way  of  doing  good  to  one  whom 
she  had  formerly  injured.  Lady  Lexley  had 
done  this,  too,  in  a  way  at  which  no  one  could 
have  taken  offence.  She  had  put  it  on  the 
score  of  their  old  friendship  for  Stanley,  not  of 
Bella's  old  fondness  for  and  falseness  to  him. 
Lady  Lexley  had  approved  herself  a  generous- 
natured,  kind-hearted,  quick-feeling  woman  in 
the  business.  Yet,  for  all  that,  Bella  felt  that 
she  would  rather  be  elsewhere,  when  she  found 
herself  driving  along  the  "  ladies'  mile,"  in  an 
open  carriage,  with  Lady  Lexley. 

"  Why  can't  we  go  straight  across  the  park, 
and  out  at  the  Marble  Arch?"  Mrs.  Claude 
asked.  She  had  not  heard  the  order  that  had 
been  given  to  her  own  footman  to  pass  on  to 
the  coachman.  She  had  taken  it  for  granted 
that  Lady  Lexley  would  have"  given  the  address 
of  the  shop,  and  that  they  should  have  driven 
there  at  once. 

Lady  Lexley  blushed.  She  was  not  a  mali- 
cious woman.  She  did  not  desire  to  harm  any 
other  woman.  But  she  had  no  intimate  female 
acquaintances,  and  in  the  course  of  transacting 
the  amiable  business  which  was  to  result  in 
good  for  the  Yillarses,  it  occurred  to  her  that 


she  might  as  well  achieve  good  for  herself,  and 
be  "seen"  a  good  deal  with  young  Mrs.  Wal- 
singham.  She  had  no  desire  to  be  the  cause  of 
a  breath  of  ill-odour  passing  over  Mrs.  Claude's 
bright  head;  but  she  could  not  refrain  from 
risking  giving  rise  to  this  breath,  in  the  hope 
that  it  might  temper  the  breeze  that  was  abroad 
about  herself — a  breeze  that  was  bitingly  sharp 
sometimes,  and  not  to  be  lulled  even  by  her 
present,  prudent,  open  course.  Lady  Lexley 
would  have  been  very  sorry  to  overshade  Mrs. 
Claude  Walsingham ;  she  would  not  do  so  wit- 
tingly. But  she  was  far  from  certain  that  she 
should  overshflde  her,  and  she  was  very  certain 
that  being  seen  with  Mrs.  Claude  could  not 
be  other  than  a  reassuring  thing  in  the  eyes 
of  all  men  who  beheld  the  sight,  about  herself. 
In  fact,  she  did  not  wish  to  work  evil  to  her 
neighbour;  she  only  wished,  and  wished  strong- 
ly too,  that  her  neighbour  might  work  good  for 
her.  It  was  very  natural.  None  can  blame 
the  womanly  yearning  for  good,  pure,  womanly 
society.  It  is  a  thing  to  be  desired — a  thing  to 
be  striven  for — a  thing  to  be  attained  at  any 
price,  Lady  Lexley  felt,  especially  in  the  open. 

So  now,  when  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  ask- 
ed rather  confusedly  why  they  could  not  drive 
straight  across  the  park,  and  out  by  the 
Marble  Arch,  Lady  Lexley  answered  that  "  it 
was  too  soon  to  go  to  the  shop  yet  awhile." 
"  That  Miss  Simpson  told  me,"  she  added,  "  that 
Mrs.  Stanley  Villars  was  coming  this  afternoon, 
but  it  would  be  too  soon  to  think  of  seeing  her 
yet  If  you  want  to  go  anywhere  else,  we  can 
go,  of  course ;  but  it's  pleasant  here,  isn't  i  ' 

"Very  pleasant,"  Bella  replied,  and  there 
came  a  blush  upon  her  cheek  as  she  spoke. 
The  air  was  very  soft  and  balmy;  but  men 
gave  not  "impertinent,"  but  long  looks  into  the 
carriage  as  they  passed,  and  Bella  began  to 
wish  that  Lady  Lexley  had  elected  to  use  her 
own  carriage  for  her  morning's  drive. 

"  Very  pleasant !  By-the  bye,  I  must  go  in- 
to Kegent  Street.  Stay !  I'll  put  you  down  at 
the  corner,  and  you  can  sit  there  and  talk  to 
people  till  I  come  back." 

Lady  Lexley  made  no  reply  for  a  moment  or 
two.  She  was  well*  inclined  towards  Mrs. 
Claude  Walsingham ;  at  the  cost  of  pain  to  her- 
self, she  would  have  shrunk  from  doing  Mrs. 
Claude  Walsingham  harm.  But  here  was  no 
tangible  harm  to  be  done,  she  thought ;  on  the 
contrary,  here  was  a  very  tangible  good  to  her- 
self. She  did  not  wish  to  injure  Bella ;  but  sho 
did  desire  that  Bella  should  serve  her. 

"  I  don't  see  any  people  to  whom  I  care  to 
talk.  No,  I'll  go  with  you  to  Eegent  Street,  if 
you'll  allow  me,"  she  said  at  last,  looking  Bella 
straight  in  the  face  as  she  spoke.  Then  Bella 
blushed  again  under  her  gaze,  and  said — 

"  Oh,  certainly !  I  only  thought —  "  and  then 
broke  down  in  her  explanation,  and  condemned 
herself  in  her  own  heart  for  having  suffered 
Miss  Harper's  undefined  shadowings  to  cloud 
over  Lady  Lexley  in  her  (Bella's)  eyes. 

The  park  had  been  bad  enough,  but  Regent 
Street  was  worse.  It  was  full  for  the  time  of 
year ;  full  of  people  who  knew  her  and  her  com- 
panion. There  were  two  or  three  blocks. 
Everybody  was  shopping  this  day;  and  their 
p  rogress  along  the  street,  till  they  came  to  the 
repository  for  carved  oak|  at  which  Mrs.  Wai- 


ON  GUARD. 


133 


singham  was  going  to  alight,  was  slow,  merci- 
lessly slow.  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  grew 
more  and  more  flushed,  and  her  manner  more 
and  more  constrained,  as  they  moved  along  at  a 
foot-pace.  And  she  was  conscious  of  these 
things,  and  sorry  for  them,  believing  as  she  did, 
in  her  innermost  heart,  that  there  was  unchari- 
tableness  and  narrow-mindedness  in  her  being 
even  inwardly  influenced  by  an  idle  word, 
idly  spoken. 

For  Grace's  manner  of  speaking  had  been 
idle,  when  looked  upon  in  cold  blood.  True, 
she  had  seemed  to  strive  to  render  it  impressive 
at  the  time,  by  calling  upon  God  to  witness  that 
she  meant  well,  and  was  earnestly  set  upon 
doing  right.  But  then  Bella  reflected  that  some 
people  are  very  apt  to  do  this  on  slight  grounds, 
and  she  argued  that  had  Miss  Harper  believed 
that  at  which  she  had  guardedly  hinted  in  ap- 
parent agony  of  spirit,  that  she  would  either 
have  said  less  or  more;  and  that  she  would 
have  refrained  from  being  effusively  affectionate 
as  she  had  been  since  to  Lady  Lexley. 

"  At  any  rate,  if  it  gives  her  any  pleasure  to 
be  with  me,  I  don't  see  that  I  need  grudge 
her  that  pleasure,"  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham 
thought,  heaving  a  sigh,  and  trying  to  get  rid 
of  a  portion  of  the  weight  that  was  upon  her. 
"  How  wicked  I  am  to  think  evil  on  the 
strength  of  the  actual  nothing — the  mere  whis- 
per— Grace  said."  Then  she  spoke  out  quite 
freely  and  joyously  to  Lady  Lexley,*spoke  in  a 
more  intimate  tone  than  she  usually  assumed 
towards  more  intimate  friends,  out  of  the  ful- 
ness of  that  foolish  generosity  on  which  Miss 
Harper  had  counted  when  she  played  the  card 
of  the  impalpable  suspicion. 

She  was  so  foolish,  this  poor  Bella.  She  had 
always  been  so  addicted  to  going  from  one  ex- 
treme to  the  other  without  due  consideration ; 
so  apt  to  forget  what  was  not  immediately 
before  her ;  so  awfully  ready  to  please  herself 
and  others  at  the  moment,  without  counting  the 
cost.  Granted  that  she  was  all  this,  still  she 
had  such  rare  ledeeming  qualities.  She  was 
so  ready  always  to  repent  and  make  amends ; 
so  incapable  of  seeing  the  bad  side  of  things  at 
the  first ;  •  so  very  sorry  to  see  them  ever,  in 
fact. 

I  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  she  was  slow  to 
wrath,  or  meekly  resigned  when  she  fancied  she 
had  been  injured  or  deceived.  On  the  contrary, 
she  was  very  quick  to  feel  slight  or  injury,  and 
to  flame  up  about  either.  But  till  she  did  so 
feel,  she  did  not  invest  her  time  in  looking 
about  for  weak  places  in  people's  characters, 
motives,  or  assertions.  She  had  a  habit  of  just 
letting  them  go  on.  It  might  have  been  amia- 
bility on  her  part,  or  it  might  have  been  mere 
idleness ;  at  all  events,  whatever  it  was,  it  saved 
her  from  being  a  mischief-maker  or  a  busy-body. 
It  also  saved  her  from  the  misery  many  more 
loudly  professing  Christians  declare  that  they 
endure — the  misery,  namely,  of  too  clearly  dis- 
cerning other  people's  faults  and  follies. 

My  heroine  was  far  from  perfect,  though,  it 
must  be  confessed ;  this  day,  for  example,  she 
had  corne  out  fraught  with  the  determination 
of  doing  all  that  might  be  done  for  poor  Stanley 
Villars  and  his  wife,  without  an  instant's  unne- 
cessary delay.  Yet  now,  not  a  couple  of  hours 
after  that  determination  had  been  in  full  bloom. 


it  faded  away,  leaving  her  blithely  regardless 
of  the  old  friend's  sad  strait,  as  soon  as  she 
found  herself  in  the  midst  of  the  carved  oak. 
Her  face  flushed  with  a  widely  different  glow 
to  that  which  had  been  upon  it  as  she  drove 
along  Regent  Street,  and  her  eyes  sparkled 
with  a  natural,  but,  perhaps,  less  praiseworthy 
excitement,  than  the  one  which  had  blazed  in 
them  when  she  had  first  listened  to  the  tale  of 
the  trials  of  the  baby-faced  •  beauty  who  had 
been  with  Rock  in  the  park. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  had  come  out  with 
her  purse  well  filled ;  and  the  contents  had  all 
been  devoted,  in  her  mind,  to  the  holy  purpose 
of  making  things  pleasanter  for  Stanley  and  his 
wife.  She  knew  well  that  he  would  rather  die 
than  suffer  her  to  relieve  his  need.  But  from 
his  wife — from  the  girl  who  was  beautiful,  but 
who  was  not  a  lady — no  such  delicacy  of  feeling 
was  to  be  expected ;  at  any  rate,  Bella  did  not 
expect  it.  Mrs.  Stanley  Villars  should  be  drill- 
ed into  silence  for  her  own  good,  as  to  favours 
received — that,  of  course;  equally  of  course 
would  it  be  that  she  should  receive  them. 

Now,  however,  that  she  found  herself  amongst 
things  that  were  very  dear  to  her  taste,  the  lat- 
ter came  to  the  fore,  and  would  be  obeyed.  Its 
government  over  Bella  was  an  absolute  monar- 
chy :  it  always  would  give  the  law.  So  now 
she  forgot  what  was  not  immediately  before  her. 
as  was  her  wont,  and  the  purse  began  to  empty 
itself  with  fatal  rapidity. 

"I'm  going  to  fit  up  a  study  for  myself,"  she 
explained  to  Lady  Lexley,  when  Lady  Lexley 
commenced  a  series  of  impatient  movements, 
all  tending  towards  the  door.  "  Oh  dear !  how 
I  wish  I  could  get  a  Robinson  Crusoe  writing- 
table,  like  that  lovely  sideboard  that  was  in  the 
'62  Exhibition  1  Do  you  remember  it  ?" 

Lady  Lexley  nodded.  She  did  not  remember 
anything  about  it;  but  it  was  easier  to  nod  than 
to  listen  to  a  description  of  it. 

u  If  you  furnish  your  own  design — any  de- 
sign— madam,  we  could  carry  it  out  for  you  as 
cheaply  as  any  house  in  the  trade,"  the  man 
who  was  waiting  on  her  here  ventured  to  sug- 


Ah !  but  I  like  to  get  what  I  see,  you  see," 
Mrs.  Claude  replied;  "  it  might  be  all  very  well 
in  my  imagination,  and  a  dead  failure  when 
carved ;  but  a  writing-table,  like  that  Robinson 
Crusoe  sideboard,"  she  went  on  lingeringly, 
"  would  be  charming." 

The  shopman,  with  the  fell  rapidity  of  his 
tribe,  had  his  order-book  out  at  once.  "  Tou 
will  allow  us  to  make  a  memorandum  of  it  for 
you,  madam?" 

Bella  shook  her  head  despondingly.  Their 
house  was  very  fully  and  completely  furnished, 
she  knew.  The  writing-table  that  had  been 
appropriated  to  her  own  special  use  was  of  oak, 
well  carved ;  but  it  was  not  a  "  Robinson  Cru- 
soe" writing-table  and  for  this  she  pined. 

"  I  think  we  had  better  be  going  on,  or  we 
shall  miss  her  to-day  ?"  Lady  Lexley  whispered  ; 
"  that  is,  if  you  are  ready  ?" 

'•  Oh !  I'm  ready — to  be  sure  I'm  ready !  Just 
wait  one  moment,  though — those  candlesticks; 
did  you  ever  see  anything  so  exquisite  ?" 

Lady  Lexley  affirmed  that  she  never  had 
seen  '!  anything  so  exquisite ;  but  would  Mrs. 
Claude  come  now  ?" 


134 


ON  GUARD. 


"  In  one  moment.  I'll  have  those  candle- 
sticks. No  I  won't — I'll  have  the  taller  ones 
with  the  gnomes'  heads  peeping  out  through 
the  flowers.  And  just  let  me  see  that  inkstand. 
Oh,  charming!  Of  course  I  must  have  that; 
wood  sprites,  and  such  wonderful  leaves:  it 
might  be  Gibbons'  carving,  mightn't  it  ?" 

Again  Lady  Lexley  nodded.  She  had  never 
"aeard  of  the  individual  referred  to;  but  it 
occured  to  her  that,  if  his  carving  was  so  supe- 
rior, Mrs.  Claude  might  as  well  have  gone  to 
him  direct,  instead  of  purchasing  what,  after 
all,  was  to  his  work  as  "  cowslip  unto  oxslip 
is." 

"  I  have  a  piece  of  furniture  that  will  please 
madam,"  the  man  here  remarked,  with  that 
subtle  air  of  seeming  to  detect  an  artistically 
appreciative  power  in  the  purchaser,  which 
sellers  acquire  by  sharp  practice.  "A  table,  a 
square  table,  carved  by  Gibbons  himself;  it  is 
very  old." 

"  "Wouldn't  you  rather  have  Gibbons  do  you 
a  new  one  ?"  Lady  Lexley  asked  aloud. 

"  We  mean  the  eighteenth  century  Gibbons," 
Bella  replied  quietly.  "  There  is  such  a  lot  of 
his  charming  works  in  Holland  House.  I  won- 
der whether  that  is  owed  to  the  Countess  of 
Warwick's  taste  or  to  Addison's  ?" 

"  This  table  I  was  speaking  of  belonged  to 
Addison,"  the  man  struck  in  gravely.  He  had 
been  casting  about  in  his  own  mind  for  a  fitting 
person  on  whom  to  fix  the  former  ownership  of 
this  excellent  article.  Addison  was  as  good  for 
the  purpose  as  any  other  man ;  therefore  with- 
out hesitation  he  asserted  that  it  had  belonged 
to  Addison,  and  so  made  Mrs.  Claude  Walsing- 
ham  happy. 

Her  happiness  was  so  patent  to  him,  how- 
ever, that  he  could  but  charge  her  a  few  pounds 
extra  for  it — a  proceeding  which  made  no  man- 
ner of  difference  to  her,  since  she  was  uncon- 
scious of  it.  He  smiled  in  gentle  pity  for  her 
inexperience  when  he  was  bowing  her  into  her 
carriage.  But  I,  for  one,  think  that  pity  mis- 
placed. It  is  so  nice  to  think  that  you  have  in 
your  possession  a  table  on  which  some  of  those 
wonderful  Tatter  and  Spectator  papers  might 
have  been  written. 

"  Perhaps  he  did  some  of  his  'Sir  Eoger  de 
Coverley'  at  it!"  Bella  cried  in  a  burst  of  en- 
thusiasm when  they  were  driving  off. 

"Who?  Gibbons?"  Lady  Lexley  replied  ab- 
sently. "  I  do  hope  we  shan't  miss  her." 

Which  remark  brought  Bella's  mind  back 
from  thoughts  of  that  golden  age — that  time 
when  Addison  had  lived  and  loved,  and  drank 
and  written — to  these  degenerate  modern  days, 
when  one  gifted  even  as  she  believed  Stanley 
Villars  to  be,  could  not  live  by  his  pen.  She 
thought  about  these  things  sadly  till  they  came 
to  the  shop  where  they  were  to  see  the  girl 
who  was  asserted  to  be  Stanley  Yillars'  wife. 
My  judgment  may  be  faulty  on  the  subject,  but 
I  confess  to  a  feeling  of  preference  for  Bella, 
the  woman  who  never  doubted  that  assertion, 
though  appearances  might  be  said  to  be  against 
its  truth,  over  the  always-correct-in-conduct 
Lady  Yillars,  whose  Christian  horror  of  evil- 
doing  led  her  to  detect  it  frequently  before  it 
was. 

The  poor  little  milliner,  who  had  deemed  it 
such  a  golden  thing  that  she  should  marry  a 


gentleman,  was,  as  has  been  seen,  in  the  habit 
of  drifting  back  here  to  the  society  that  was 
most  congenial  to  her.  She  was  rather  at  a 
premium  in  the  show-room.  She  served  as  a 
subject  for  conversation  amongst  the  "young 
ladies  "  in  their  hours  of  idleness.  She  could 
be  let  off  as  a  successful  fact — a  genuine  case 
of  "risen  from  the  ranks" — at  the  heads  of 
languid  lady  customers,  who  were  willing  to 
linger  over  garments  of  divers  shapes  in  weary- 
ing uncertainty.  When  expatiating  on  the 
"elegance"  and  "perfect  style"  of  an  opera 
cloak,  for  example,  the  adroit  Miss  Simpson 
would  tell  in  touching  tones  how  sure  said 
opera  cloak  would  have  been  to  win  the  hearts 
of  all  beholders,  had  it  but  been  seen  over 
the  shoulders  of  the  late  Miss  Wallis,  pro- 
moted. "This  grew,"  till  half  the  habitual 
customers  of  the  place  knew  that,  in  some  way 
or  other,  "  the  man  that  Bella  Vane  had  jilted 
had  made  a  mess  of  it." 


CHAPTER   XLL 

A  PRACTICAL  CHRISTIAN. 

IT  need  not  be  told  how,  even  at  this  their  first 
meeting,  the  kindly  lady  who  was  "  the  cause," 
she  felt,  in«a  measure,  of  the  sorrow  that  had 
come  upon  the  girl,  and  the  gentle,  unpretend- 
ing girl  on  whom  the  sorrow  had  fallen,  under- 
stood one  another,  and  came  together  as  it 
were.  There  was  something  inexpressibly 
winning  to  Marian,  who  had  never  met  with  it 
before,  in  the  rich,  fearless  warmth  of  Mrs. 
Walsingham's  manner  towards  her.  Bella 
turned  to  her  at  once  when  she  came  into  the 
room,  and  found  her  there  already  installed, 
and,  it  must  be  confessed,  gratingly  familiar 
with  her  not  too  refined  former  companions. 
Turned  to  her  at  once — with  no  crushing  con- 
descension— with  no  mock  "  I  am  as  thou  art " 
demeanour — with  no  false  superiority — no  de- 
grading to  one  as  to  the  other  patronage — but 
with  a  great  big  hearty  kindness,  that  proved 
she  took  the  girl  at  once  for  what  she  stated 
herself  to  be,  and  looked.  Turned  to  her  as 
Bella  would  have  turned  to  a  duchess  in  dis- 
tress— in  a  way  that  made  Lady  Lexley's  eyes 
dilate  with  womanly  sympathy,  as  belladonna 
had  never  caused  them  to  do. 

Their  interview  was  not  very  long.  When 
a  few  facts  had  been  stated  by  the  young  wife, 
and  listened  to  by  Bella,  they  both  found  that 
they  had  little  left  to  say.  "  I  should  like  to 
come  and  see  you,  and  him;  we  are  such  old 
friends,"  Mrs.  Walsingham  said  with  a  little 
gasp,  when  Marian  said  "she  must  go  now,  or 
Stanley  would  be  cross."  On  the  statement  of 
which  desire  Marian  shook  her  head  dubiously, 
and  replied  that  she  "  was  sure  Stanley  wouldn't 
bear  to  see  any  of  bis  old  friends,"  and  let  her 
lip  quiver  as  she  said  it,  and  suffered  a  round, 
quickly-dried  tear  to  fall. 

"But  I  must  see  you  both,"  Bella  urged, 
"  now  we  have  met  again,  and  he  is  ill." 

"  He  has  made  me  promise  never  to  go  near 
any  of  his  family,  or  let  them"  come  near  him," 
Marian  said  sorrowfully.  And  at  that  even 


ON  GUARD. 


135 


kind-hearted  Lady  Lexley  shook  her  head,  and 
said  to  herself,  "  That  looks  bad." 

But  Bella  was  above  suspicion  as  regarded 
Stanley  Villars.  It  was  all  very  well,  or  rather 
it  was  perhaps  natural,  that  others  should  dis- 
trust him,  and  think  that,  because  his  first  guard 
had  been  broken  down,  that  evil  should  have 
entered  in  to  the  once  well-defenced  citadel, 
and  have  its  own  way  entirely.  It  was  perhaps 
natural  that  others  should  think  this.  But  it 
would  have  been  unnatural  for  her  to  think  it, 
knowing  the  man  as  she  did.  The  wrong  he 
had  wrought,  whatever  it  might  be,  that  had 
made  him  desire  to  cut  himself  off  from  his 
family,  had  not  been  a  wrong  to  this  innocent, 
fond,  trusting  girl. 

"  At  any  rate  let  me  come  and  see  him,"  Mrs. 
Walsingham  urged.  "As  to  his  own  family, 
between  him  and  them  I  can't  interfere,  of 
course ;  but  my  husband  was  like  his  brother ; 
why  should  he  wish  to  cut  us  ?" 

"I  never  heard  him  name  you"  Marian  said 
wonder  in  gly. 

Bella  blushed.  "How  wrong  of  him,"  she 
said  quickly;  "he  should  have  brought  us 
together,  and  made  us  friends.  Are  you  fond 
of  Rock?" 

The  brief  pang  that  had  been  Marian's  portion 
that  day  in  the  park,  when  Rock  had  leapt  with 
a  dog's  enthusiasm  about  his  old  mistress, 
assailed  her  (Marian)  again  now. 

"  Did  you  give  him  to  Stanley  ?"  she  asked  in 
a  low  tone. 

"  Yes,  I  gave  him  Rock ;  and  now  Rock  has 
rewarded  me  by  first  making  you  known  to 
me,"  Bella  replied  heartily.  She  understood 
perfectly  well  the  nature  of  that  pang  which 
caused  the  baby-faced  beauty  to  speak  in  a 
lower  voice. 

The  interview  ended  satisfactorily.  Marian 
was  persuaded  to  give  up  her  address.  She  was 
also  induced  to  "  try  and  think"  whether  there 
was  anything  Stanley  might  possibly  like.  But 
she  shook  her  head  in  resolute  refusal  to  "think" 
even  that  he  might  possibly  care  for  anything 
save  some  flowers.  On  being  put  to  the  test, 
she^howed  herself  in  fact  to  be  far  from  deficient 
in  that  special  phase  of  delicacy  which  Mrs. 
Walsingham  had  felt  sure  would  not  be  a  con- 
spicuous attribute  in  one  "  of  her  class." 

So  the  roses  were  procured  from  the  sacred 
recesses  of  a  damp  drawer  in  a  shop  in  Covent 
Garden  market.  Lovely  roses — not  cut  off,  and 
wired-up,  and  gummed,  and  otherwise  manufac- 
tured—but fresh,  fair,  natural  flowers,  with  long 
stalks  and  lots  of  leaves,  and  fragrance  unim- 
paired. Lovely  roses !  that  brought  back  the 
memory  of  bygone  summer-days  to  Bella,  even 
as  they  brought  them  back  the  following  morn- 
ing to  poor,  sick,  suffering  Stanley. 

Before  they  parted,  Marian  acceded  to  Mrs. 
Walsingham' s  proposition  of  calling  to  see  Stan- 
ley on  the  following  day ;  and,  as  is  the  habit 
of  women,  she  had  no  sooner  acceded  to  it,  than 
she  began  to  entertain  it  enthusiastically,  press- 
ing Bella  to  "make  it  early,"  with  a  half-shy 
familiarity,  that  Bella  would  have  watched  with 
a  feeling  of  semi-amusement  in  any  woman  save 
Stanley's  wife. 

When  they  were  driving  back  to  Eaton  Square, 
in  order  that  Lady  Lexley  might  be  deposited 
before  Mrs.  Walsingham  proceeded  home,  the 


evil  spirit  of  over-caution  seized  the   usually 
unguarded  Circe. 

"  If  I  were  you,  as  those  poor  people  want  to 
keep  close  for  reasons  best  known  to  themselves, 
my  dear,  I  woulcfn't  say  a  word  of  the  matter 
to  Grace  Harper ;  she  has  a  way  of  telling  things 
that  makes  them  change  colour." 

Bella  winced.  It  is  always  unpleasant  when 
two  people  take  it  into  their  well-meaning- 
heads  to  put  you — the  luckless  third — on  guard 
against  each  other. 

"Well,  I  won't,  till  Claude  thinks  I  may." 

"  Oh,  of  course,  you'll  do  as  you  please  in  the 
matter;  I  have  no  motive  for  concealment," 
Lady  Lexley  replied,  carelessly;  "but  I  have 
seen  a  good  deal  of  Miss  Grace,  you  know,  and, 
as  I  said  before,  she  has  a  way  of  telling  things 
that  makes  them  change  colour." 

"Do  you  mean  that  she  tells  stories?"  Bella 
asked  quickly. 

"  That's  such  an  angular  way  of  putting  it. 
No ;  you'll  never  catch  her  out  in  a  story,  if  you 
lie  in  wait  for  her  till  the  day  of  judgment ; 
she  really  does  stick  to  the  letter — excuse  the 
idiom." 

"Then  how  does  she  change  the  colour  of 
things?"  Bella  inquired. 

"  Mother  of  God !  how  should  I  know  ?"  Lady 
Lexley  cried,  almost  passionately.  "  She  does  it, 
she  does  it — but  how  ?  What  does  it  matter, 
though?"  she  continued,  with  a  sudden  change 
of  manner. 

"  Only  that  some  time  or  other  harm  may 
come  of  her  peculiar — talent,"  Bella  said,  hesi- 
tatingly. 

"  Harm  come  of  it  1"  Lady  Lexley  replied, 
laughing.  Then  the  slumbering  southerti  fire 
in  her  blood  blazed  up,  and  she  added,  "  If  harm 
came  through  it  to  me,  I  would  tear  her  thick 
white  skin  off  her  face  in  strips,  and  have  her 
hissed  at  the  church  door ;  that  would  sting  her 
more  than  anything!"  she  continued,  with  a 
bright  laugh,  that  made  Bella's  blood  curdle, 
coming  as  it  did  immediately  after  the  enuncia- 
tion of  such  sanguinary  sentiments. 

Miss  Harper's  head  was  quite  well  when  Mrs. 
Walsingham  got  home.  Grace  looked  so  cool, 
so  good,  and  unemotional,  as  she  raised  her 
head  to  greet  her  hostess,  that  Bella  felt  her 
to  be  almost  a  relief,  after  turbulent  Lady 
Lexley. 

"  I  am  sorry  you  could  not  go "  "  with 

me,"  Bella  was  going  to  say,  but  she  paused  on 
the  brink  of  the  polite  perfidy,  and  substituted 
"  out  for  a  drive." 

"Oh,  thank  you;  but  I  have  been  very  well 
amused,  dear  Mrs.  Walsingham,"  Grace  replied, 
indicating,  as  she  spoke,  the  book  she  held  in 
her  hand  as  the  source  of  her  amusement. 

"  What  is  it?"  Mrs.  Walsingham  asked.  Then 
she  looked  again,  and  added,  "Oh!  Stanley 
Villars' novel!" 

Miss  Harper  nodded.  "  Perhaps  the  worst 
thing  about  such  works,"  she  said  in  a  sort  of 
humble  and  contrite  tone,  "  is  that  they  absorb 
you  against  your  convictions." 

"You  mean  they  amuse  you,  I  suppose, 
whether  you  want  to  go  on  reading  just  at  the 
time  or  not;  that's  my  idea  of  what  a  novel 
should  do,"  Bella  replied,  hardily. 

Grace  shook  her  head.  '"Jhe  novelist 
has  so  much  in 'his  power,  if  he  only  uses 


136 


ON  GUARD. 


his  gifts  aright,"  she  said,  in  the  same  tone  as 
before. 

"  If  he  gets  good  prices,  he  has  as  much  and 
no  more  in  his  power  than  other  men  with 
money,"  Bella  replied,  wilfully  misunderstand- 
ing the  fair  critic,  and  trusting  fondly  that  by 
so  doing,  she  should  avert  the  bolt  of  censure 
which  she  perceived  was  in  readiness  to  be  let 
fly  at  her. 

"  I  can  only  say  that  I  am  glad  the  man  who 
wrote  that  book  is  no  friend  of  mine,"  Grace 
went  on,  with  the  faintest  tinge  of  colour  coming 
upon  her  cheeks.  That  is  one  of  the  great  ad- 
vantages fair  women  have  over  duskier  ones ; 
they  can  get  into  a  terrible  passion  without  at 
the  same  time  getting  red  in  the  face. 

"  I  dare  say  you  wouldn't  care  for  literary 
society."  Bella  spoke  coolly;  but  her  heart 
was  hot  within  her.  It  was  hard  to  hear  the 
man  who  had  nearly  burst  his  brain  over  the 
work  that  was  daily  bread  to  him — who  had 
broken  down  as  Stanley  Villars  had ! — it  was 
hard  to  hear  him  thus  lightly  judged  by  a  medio- 
cre woman  with  yellow  eyelashes 

But  she  would  not  have  put  in  this  plea — 
that  he  had  striven  while  strength  was  his  to 
strive,  and  failed  in  agony — for  all  the  goods 
the.  gods  had  ever  given  her.  She  would  not 
have  done  it.  She  could  not  have  done  it. 
There  are  some  people  whom  even  their  friends 
dare  not  attempt  to  excuse. 

The  battle  is  not  always  to  the  strong,  nor  is 
the  race  invariably  to  the  swift.  Miss  Harper 
was  mentally  a  far  weaker  woman  than  the 
one  with  whom  she  was  combating.  That  she 
was  "  slow,"  no  man  could  be  found  to  deny. 
But  for  all  these  things  she  was  likely  to  come 
in  winner  in  this  contest  upon  which  she  had 
entered.  For  her  blood  ran  coldly  in  her  veins 
about  all  things  that  did  not  immediately  con- 
cern herself,  and  when  the  circulation  is  thus 
well-regulated,  success  in  all  matters  of  feeling 
is  inevitable. 

"I  can  only  say,"  Miss  Harper  repeated, 
dogmatically,  "that  I  am  very  glad  that  the 
man  who  wrote  that  book  is  no  friend  of  mine." 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  heaved,  but  held 
her  peace. 

"It  must  be  very  painful  to  you,  dear  Mrs. 
Claude,  to  peruse  such  sentiments  as  I  find 
here,"  Grace  persisted,  tapping  the  book  with 
her  soft,  white  finger  as  she  spoke.  It  was  a 
peculiarity  of  those  fingers  of  hers,  that,  soft, 
white,  and  well  rounded  as  they  were,  they  yet 
had  a  lazy,  cruel  look.  Mrs.  Claude  "Walsing- 
ham  was  fascinated  into  glancing  wistfully  at 
them,  as  though  they  were  things  that  must  be 
watched  and  warded  off,  as  she  answered — 

"  The  author  being  a  friend  of  mine,  maybe 
I  have  lost  judgment  about  his  work." 

"Then  the  book  is  likely  to  be  more  perni- 
cious to  you  than  to  me,"  Grace  replied,  calmly; 
"  you  ought  not  to  read  it." 

"  I  am  greatly  obliged  to  you  for  the  caution ; 
but  on  such  a  point  you  must  allow  me  to  judge 
for  myself,"  Bella  answered,  speaking  with  that 
fatal  coolness  which  is  the  sure  precursor  of  a 
storm. 

Grace  Harper  smiled  inwardly.  Inwardly, 
too,  she  told  herself  that  she  was  really  only 
doing  her  duty  in  striving  to  irritate  Bella,  and 
depreciate  the  work  of  the  man  whose  views 


differed  from  her  own.  "What  those  views  were 
is  very  immaterial  to  my  story.  They  are 
simply  alluded  to  in  order  that  Bella's  motive 
for  acting  as  she  is  going  to  act  may  be  made 
manifest. 

"  I  should  be  false  to  myself,  and  to  every- 
thing that  I  have  ever  been  taught,"  Miss  Harper 
said  in  her  stolid  way,  "  if  I  did  not  tell  you 
what  I  think  about  Mr.  Stanley  Villars'  ideas." 

"  You  have  told  me."  (Then  the  servant  came 
in,  and  announced  dinner.)  "  Yery  well,  Hill. 
Now,  Grace,  we  must  escort  ourselves  in  to  the 
dining-room.  "Oh  dear!"  she  continued,  as 
they  were  coming  down  stairs,  "  how  I  wish  my 
husband  were  back  1" 

Miss  Harper  did  not  echo  the  wish.  She  only 
smiled,  and  thought  "  I  hope  he  won't  be  back 
yet.  What  a  nuisance  that  '  dinner '  should 
have  come  in  the  way  just  then !  She  was  ready 
to  say  anything." 

Later  in  the  evening  the  subject  was  renew- 
ed in  this  way.  Mrs.  Claude  rang  the  bell,  and 
ordered  Hill,  when  he  came,  to  "  take  back  the 
two  volume%  that  are  lying  on  that  table  to 
Mudie's,  to-morrow  morning,  and  ask  for  the 
third." 

<:Is  it  'Never  a  Chance,'  that  you're  sending 
back  ?"  Miss  Harper  asked,  mentioning  the  title 
of  that  work  of  poor  Stanley's  which  was  indeed 
but  a  reflex  of  his  life. 

"Yes,"  Bella  replied,  briefly. 

"  Oh,  I'm  sorry ! — I  haven't  done  with  it." 

"Put  it  down,  Hill — don't  take  it  1"  his  mis- 
tress exclaimed,  sharply,  to  the  hesitating  ser- 
vant. As  soon  as  he  was  out  of  the  room,  she 
continued,  "I  beg  your  pardon — but  I  could 
not  imagine,  after  what  you  said,  that  you  were 
going  on  with  the  book ;  otherwise,  of  course,  I 
should  not  have  thought  of  sending  it  away." 

"  Oh,  yes  I  I  confess  to  being  interested  in  it; 
and  that's  just  where  I  feel  the  book  will  work 
evil — the  trail  of  the  serpent  is  there,  covered 
with  flowers." 

Grace  came  forward  as  she  spoke,  and  seated 
herself  on  a  low  stool  near  the  feet  of  her  hos- 
tess, with  her  own  back  to  the  light,  and  her 
yellow  lashes  lowered.  Bella  was  facing  what 
light  there  was  left  in  the  sky,  and  her  eyes 
were  open — wide  open — and  filled  with  an  hon- 
est anger. 

"  Once  more  I  must  remind  you,  Grace,  that 
Stanley  Yillars  is  my  husband's  friend  and 
mine;  I  cannot  hear  him  spoken  of  in  this 
way." 

"  I  should  be  untrue  to  the  principles — the 
holy  principles  in  which  I  have  been  reared — if 
I  did  not  tell  you  what  I  think  about  it— if  I 
did  not  lift  up  my  voice  in  warning,"  Miss 
Harper  said,  humbly,  just  glancing  through  the 
pale  lashes  at  the  flushed,  excited  enemy. 

"  Having  told  me,  let  there  be  an  end  of  it. 
I  am  not  responsible  for  a  line  that  may  be  in 
that  book.  I  neither  care  to  uphold  nor  to  de- 
fend it.  I  simply  want  not  to  talk  to  you 
about  it." 

A  sudden  fear  seized  Bella  that  this  girl, 
whom  she  had  liked  and  trusted  as  a  nice,  soft, 
womtmly  creature,  would  be  too  many  for  her 
were  warfare  declared.  Miss  Harper  was 
forcing  the  subject  into  a  serious  light ;  she  was 
being  solemn  in  her  severity,  and  seeming  to 
threaten  darkly.  Bella  grew  very  nervous. 


ON  GUAKD. 


137 


Was  there  anything  so  bad  in  the  book  that 
first  holy  principles — principles  Bella  revered 
to  the  full  as  much  as  did  the  fair  Pharisee  at 
her  side — were  assailed  by  it  ?  Bella  grew  very 
nervous ;  but  nervous  as  she  was,  it  was  farther 
than  before  from  her  mind  to  desert  Stanley 
Villars. 

"  We  should  not  shrink  from  a  subject  simply 
because  it's  unpleasant  to  us,"  Miss  Harper  re- 
joined. 

"Now,  Grace,  that  is  all  very  well;  but  we 
all  do  shrink  from  an  unpleasant  subject.  You'd 
shrink  from  it  if  it  were  unpleasant  to  you." 

"  Can  it  be  pleasant  to  me  to  run  the  risk  of 
offending  you,  dear  ?"  Miss  Harper  asked,  more 
effusively  than  was  her  wont. 

"  I  don't  know  ;  but  it's  certainly  pleasant  to 
you#to  censure  Stanley  Villars." 

"I  want  to  spare  you  pain  in  the  future, 
^od  knows  what  is  in  my  heart!" 

"  Well,  I  don't !"  Bella  cried,  almost  writhing 
away  from  Grace's  side.  There  was  something 
terrible — something  horrible — in  this  mixture 
of  worldly  animus  with  piety. 

"Don't  use  a  tone  of  levity  about  such 
things,  dear  I"  Grace  pleaded,  with  an  earnest- 
ness that  would  have  been  very  effective,  had 
not  Bella  caught  the  quick  glance  that  was 
levelled  simulfaneously  through  the  yellow 
lashes. 

"  I  am  not  going  to  use  a  tone  of  levity,  or 
any  other  tone,  about  it  any  more!"  Mrs. 
Claude  replied,  firmly.  "  You  will  please  to 
recall  two  things  to  your  mind  that  you  appear 
to  have  forgotten :  I  am  neither  a  child  to  be 
reprimanded,  nor  a  heathen  to  be  converted !" 

"  A  word  spoken  in  season "  Miss  Grace 

was  commencing,  when  Bella  interrupted  her. 

"  This  is  really  too  much,  Miss  Harper!"  she 
cried  indignantly.  "  Once  for  all — I  will  not 
hear  another  word,  in  season  or  out  of  season, 
on  the  subject !" 

"  Only  this — oh,  do,  for  your  own  sake!" 
Grace  said,  with  a  mild  persistence,  that  was 
hard— very  hard — to  endure.  "I  know  the 
Walsinghams  so  well — perhaps  even  better  than 
you  do — though  you've  married  into  the  family. 
Forgive  me — it's  all  interest  for  you,  and  desire 
to  see  you  keep  straight  with  them.  They'd 
one  and  all  think  there  was  pollution  in  coming 
in  contact  with  one  who  could  sympathise  with 
the  man  who  wrote  that  book  I" 

With  that,  she  rose  from  her  little  stool  at 
Bella's  side,  and  Bella — her  heart  swelling  with 
a  dozen  conflicting  feelings — registered  a  vow 
on  the  spot  to  seek  that  man  and  his  poor  little 
wife  on  the  morrow,  and  give  them  such  com- 
fort as  it  was  in  her  poor  power  to  bestow. 

"  It  has  been  a  thankless  office,  but  I  shall 
have  my  reward,"  Grace  said  modestly  to  her- 
self, after  saying  her  prayers  that  night ;  and 
deceitful  as  she  was,  she  really  meant  it.  In 
fact,  her  deceit  was  of  so  fine  a  kind,  that  it 
imposed  upon  herself.  She  really  believed  that 
she  had  been  actuated  by  some  higher  motive 
than  a  desire  to  irritate  Bella  into  too  warm  a 
partisanship  for  Stanley  Yillars.  She  really 
fancied  at  some  moments  that  there  had  been 
more  sincerity  than  spite  in  her  endeavours. 
She  really  imagined  that  she  had  been  a  practi- 
cal as  well  as  a  professing  Christian  this  night ! 
And  so  she  told  herself,  with  a  sort  of  humble 


unction,  "that  she  would  have  her  reward" — 
which  I  sincerely  hope  she  will. 


CHAPTER  XLII. 

"  THAT  WAS  EATHER  STRANGE." 

I 

ALL  this  time,  while  I  have  been  tracing  out, 
link  by  link,  the  chain  of  events  which  led  her 
there,  Bella  has  been  waiting  by  the  side  of 
Stanley  Yillars'  couch.  She  had  come  to  the 
meeting  this  morning  with  a  sort  of  defiant 
secresy.  Openly  at  breakfast  had  she  ordered 
her  carriage.  Openly  had  she  declared  to  Miss 
Harper  that  she  was  bent  on  a  mission  on 
which  it  did  not  suit  her  to  be  accompanied,  to 
which  declaration  Miss  Harper  had  listened 
calmly,  with  an  unsuspicious  air.  It  did  not 
seem  well  to  Grace  to  make  Mrs.  Claude  con- 
fide. The  withholding  of  confidence  did  not 
look  so  well;  and,  somehow  or  other,  Miss 
Harper  was  not  averse  to  seeing  things  that  did 
not  look  well  about  Bella. 

Bella  had  received  a  letter  from  her  husband 
again  this  morning.  "  Ellen  has  been  reading 
'  Never  a  Chance,'  "  he  told  her;  "  and  she  has 
done  nothing  but  shudder  ever  since.  I  sup- 
pose he  has  run  his  head  against  a  stone  wall ; 
but  it's  of  no  use  saying  a  syllable  about  him 
here  that  can  be  considered  justificatory.  As 
we  have  drifted  apart  now,  it's  just  as  well  that 
you  never  mention  him,  as  you're  apt  to  do,  in 
your  warm,  honest  way." 

So  her  husband  even,  Claude  the  magnifi- 
cent, on  whose  generosity  she  would  far  sooner 
have  relied  than  on  her  own,  thought  that  as 
the  man  was  down — as  he  had  fallen  in  the 
struggle — it  would  be  quite  as  well  to  leave 
him  there  I  Her  blood  curdled  as  she  thought 
of  what  Stanley  had  been  in  those  Denham 
days,  and  all  his  life  before  them.  Her  blood 
curdled;  for  when  she  remembered  things  at 
all,  she  remembered  them  with  a  terrible  vivid- 
ness that  makes  each  recalled  moment  one  of 
vital  agony.  "  What  they  do,  the  cold-blooded 
wretches"  (by  "they"  she  meant  her  husband's 
family,  and  their  own  familiar  friend,  Miss 
Grace),  "is  nothing;  but  Claude  should  be 
different — Claude  should  remember  my  part  in 
the  business,  and  be  merciful,  or  at  least  just. 

She  could  not  answer  her  husband's  letter  at 
once.  She  thought  she  would  go  and  see  Stan- 
ley first,  and  then,  with  the  sight  of  him  fresh 
in  her  mind,  would  come  back  and  write 
such  a  letter  to  Claude  as  should  at  once  bring 
him  over  triumphantly  to  her  side.  She  had  no 
design,  when  she  started,  of  keeping  aught  she 
had  done  or  was  going  to  do  from  her  husband. 
She  meant  to  tell  him  all,  the  hour  he  returned. 
She  had  done  no  wrong ;  she  was  neither  doing 
nor  contemplating  wrong.  She  was  merely 
obeying  the  dictates  of  humanity;  yet  she  took 
the  first  step  into  danger  when  she  went  off  to 
see  Stanley  Yillars  without  first  writing  to  tell 
her  husband  that  she  was  going  to  do  so. 

All  hard  feeling,  all  anger  and  indignation, 
against  those  who  trampled  on  his  name,  and 
passed  him  by,  vanished  from  her  heart  when 
she  stood  by  the  side  of  the  man  she  had  once 
loved,  and  marked  as  the  stranger  who  sees  him 


138 


ON  GUARD. 


not  daily  is  quick  to  mark,  .that  he  was  dying. 
It  might  be  a  little  sooner  or  a  little  later.  He 
might  linger  here  and  there,  could  any  stage  be 
made  easy  and  pleasant  for  him ;  but  the  last 
journey  was  entered  upon — he  was  dying  1 

He  opened  his  eyes,  expecting,  as  I  have  said, 
to  see  his  sister  Florence ;  but  he  gave  no  start 
when  he  saw  Bella,  only  his  heart  thumped 
audibly,  as  he  aiked — 

"  Ah !  how  did  you  find  us  out  ?" 

He  said  "us,"  holding  out  a  hand  towards 
the  wife,  who  stood  in  the  background.  There 
was  something  very  touching  to  Bella  in  that 
gesture,  which  identified  the  poor  girl  he  had 
married  at  once  and  entirely  with  himself.  He 
was  such  a  thorough  gentleman,  you  see !  Bella 
proudly  and  promptly  recognised  the  old  trait — 
a  thorough  gentleman !  quick  to  spare  the  feel- 
ings of  any  one  who  was  weaker  than  himself. 

His  old  love,  his  former  friend's  wife,  gave 
her  hand  into  his  with  the  willing  warmth  a 
sister  might  have  shown. 

"  I  found  you  out  through  your  wife,  Stanley," 
she  said  simply.  "God  forgive  us  all,"  she 
added  passionately,  "  for  not  having  found  you 
out  before!" 

Her  thought  showed  itself  clearly  to  him. 
She  saw  that  it  was  too  late,  that  he  was  a 
dying  man.  He  had  felt  this  sorrowful  truth 
strongly  within  himself  once  or  twice  of  late ; 
but  it  oppressed  him  with  a  new  horror,  now 
that  it  was  illustrated,  as  it  were,  by  the  man- 
ner of  another. 

"Wearily  he  turned  his  head  round  on  the  sofa 
pillow  till  only  his  profile  was  seen  by  the  two 
women  who  stood  over  him,  the  one  weeping 
with  a  wounding  pain,  the  other  wondering  why 
this  meeting,  towards  which  she  had  decked 
the  room,  should  be  turning  out  so  dismally. 
"  I  thought  you  would  cheer  him,"  she  whisper- 
ed presently  to  Bella;  "he  only  wants  rousing. 
He  gets  so  dull  when  none  of  the  men  he  knows 
are  with  him." 

''  They  come  often,  I  hope  ?"  Bella  asked, 
half  hoping  that  "they"  might  be  some  of  his 
old  friends. 

"  Oh,  yes !  often ;  but  then  they  smoke,  and 
that  makes  him  cough.  "When  he  gets  rid  of 
that  cough,  and  needn't  work  so  hard,  he'll  be 
all  right,  won't  he  ?  "Won't  you,  Stanley  ?" 

Marian  asked  this  as  we  sometimes  ask  that 
which,  in  our  own  hearts,  we  dare  not  hope  to 
have  truly  answered.  For  the  first  time  it  had 
struck  her  this  day — this  very  hour,  indeed — 
that  there  was  a  huge  sorrow  in  store  for  her. 
For  the  first  time  she  had  come  to  the  knowledge 
of  the  wounding  truth  that  her  husband's  was 
no  mere  ordinary  illness. 

He  managed  to  bring  his  head  round  to  face 
them  again,  as  his  wife's  words  died  away. 

"  Marian,  my  pet!"  he  said ;  and  Bella  loved 
him  so  dearly  then,  in  her  own  pure,  honest 
heart,  for  thus  addressing  the  woman  who  had 
superseded  her — "  Marian,  my  pet,  you  must 
tell  Mrs.  "Walsingham  how  we  met  first.  You 
must  tell  her  what  an  angel  you  have  been  to 
me ;  and  then,  dear,  she  will  love  you,  and  un- 
derstand how  I  love  you  too !  Come,  cheer  up, 
pet!" 

He  smiled  his  old,  sweet,  protecting  smile 
upon  Marian ;  but  the  poor  "  pet"  could  not 
"  cheer  up."  The  dread  that  had  seized  her 


was  so  heavy  and  so  strange :  she  could  not 
cheer  up  under  it. 

"You  shall  tell  me  yourself,  Stanley,"  Bella 
said,  softly,  drawing  the  lovely  young  face, 
down  which  the  scalding  tears  were  now  pouring, 
on  to  her  own  shoulders.  "  You  shall  tell  me, 
yourself;  and  first  tell  me  were  you  married 
when  you  came  to  see  Claude  and  me  ?" 

"  Yes,"  he  said. 

"  And  you  did  not  tell  us.  Oh !  Stanley,  that 
was  not  fair  to  me !" 

"  And  he's  been  so  ill  since,  and  not  one  of 
his  old  friends  has  been  near  him  ;  and  I  know 
that  it's  all  because  he  married  me-e-e,"  Marian 
sobbed  out,  miserably. 

"Not  a  bit;  his  old  friends  will  come,  now 
they  know  where  to  find  him,  you  silly  child ! 
Oh!  I  wish  Claude  were  here,"  Bella  cited 
impetuously ;  "  he's  away  now  with  his  father, 
who's  ill,  you  know ;  but  as  soon  as  he  comes 
back  I  shall  bring  him." 

Stanley's  face  fell. 

"  I  shall  not  ask  you  many  more  favours,  Mrs. 
"Walsingham,"  he  began,  in  a  low  voice.  "  "Will 
you  grant  me  one  ?  " 

"  One,  Stanley !  a  thousand  if  you  will ! "  He 
looked  at  her  very  kindly. 

"Rash,  as  of  old,  I  see.  "Well,"— with  a 
slight  movement  of  his  head,  *as  though  he 
would  have  thrown  off  the  very  memory  of  it 
— "  that's  past.  This  is  my  favour — I  can't  ask 
you  not  to  come  near  us,  now  I  see  you,  and 

find  you "  He  gulped,  and  could  not  finish 

his  sentence,  and  Bella  did  what  women  are 
sure  to  do  when  they  feel  perplexed — wept 
copiously. 

"  Marian,  go  and  get  me  a  glass  of  lemonade, 
dear,"  he  said,  suddenly;  and  when  Marian 
was  gone  on  his  mission,  he  went  on,  hur- 
riedly— 

"I  couldn't  say  it  before  her,  poor  darling; 
but  I'm  dying,  Bella,  you  know  that." 

"  Don't,  don't!  "  she  implored ;  " don't  say  it, 
Stanley!" 

"  It's  true— 'I  know  it — and  as  I  have  little 
enough  to  live  for,  it's  as  well.  Don't  let  me 
think,  though,  that  you  press  Claude  to  see  me 
against  his  will,  or  that  he  refuses  to  grant  your 
request,  as  I  shall  think,  whether  he  comes  or 
does  not  come,  if  you  go  away  intending  to  ask 
him.  Don't  let  me  think  that." 

"  He  will  come ;  you  don't  know  Claude." 

"  I  do  know  him,"  he  cried,  starting  up  on 
his  elbow.  "  Bella !  by  the  old  love  that  was 
between  us  once,  don't  subject  me  to  such  a 
cursed  humiliation.  It's  nearly  all  over  with 
me ;  don't  you  be  the  one  to  stab  me  at  the 
last." 

Her  voice  went  up  almost  with  a  wail  as  she 
replied — 

"  It  is  too  hard,  too  hard !  " 

"  It  is  too  hard — don't  you  make  it  harder." 

"Stanley,  I  can't  argue,  but  how  you  wrong 
ray  husband ! " 

Ho  sank  back  again,  flushed  and  breathless. 

"  Do  you  see  what  I  am  now  ? "  he  asked. 
"  Do  you  see  that  it  must  be  over  soon  ?  Bella ! 
it's  the  last  thing  I  ask  of  you.  You  have 
found  me  out — God  knows,  through  no  will  of 
mine — respect  the  secret  you  have  surprised ; 
let  no  one  hear,  through  you,  of  me,  and  of  my 
misery ! " 


ON  GUARD. 


139 


He  spoke  bitterly  and  sternly,  and  Bella's 
heart  throbbed  to  each  accent  of  his,  in  fear,  as 
it  had  never  done  in  love. 

"You  are  mistaken,"  she  was  .beginning  to 
plead;  but  he  checked  her,  and  repeated  his 
charge,  that  through  her  no  one  should  know 
of  him  and  of  his  misery.  "  Unless  you  will 
promise  me  this,  I  will  cut  off  the  only  pleasure 
left  to  me  from  the  past.  I  will  never  see  you 
again,  and  thus  my  poor  little  wife  may  lose  a 
friend." 

"  But,  unless  I  let  it  be  known  that  she  is 
your  wife,  how  can  I  be  her  friend  ?  as  I  will 
be,  heaven  help  me,  if  I  am  permitted ! '' 

But,  with  a  man's  perverseness,  he  would  not 
see  the  force  of  this. 

"You  maybe  a  friend  to  her  when  I  am 
gone,  but,  while  I  live,  I  will  live  out  of  sight 
of  the  sneers  that  are  given  about  me." 

4i  Oh,  Stanley !  what  a  distorted  view  to  take," 
she  said ;  and  then  Marian  came  back  with  the 
lemonade,  and  th^subject  was  dropped. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  sat  there  for  an 
hour,  after  Marian  came  back  with  the  lemonade, 
listening  to  the  story  of  "  how  she  (Marian)  had 
met  with  Stanley."  It  was  not  such  a  very 
long  story  in  itself,  as  the  reader  already  knows ; 
but  it  took  a  long  time  Ijp  tell,  nevertheless,  for 
Marian  had  not  the  art  of  telling  things  con- 
cisely. She  interlarded  her  account  with  dis- 
cursive passages — bringing  in,  without  sufficient 
cause,  the  suggestions  and  suppositions  Rayner, 
Miss  Simpson,  and  others  of  that  ilk,  had  in- 
dulged in.  She  told  very  artlessly  how  differ- 
ent her  wedding  had  been  to  what  she  had 
always  felt  sure  it  would  be  if  she  married  a 
gentleman.  She  did  not  say  how  different  her 
after-married  life  had  been !  Poor  girl  1  there 
was  not  the  faintest  shadow  of  complaint  in 
the  story  that  she  told.  It  might  have  been 
bravery,  or  it  might  have  been  love,  which  kept 
her  silent  on  this  point.  But  whatever  it  was, 
Bella  respected  her  for  it. 

I  am  not  by  any  means  sure  that  Mrs.  Claude 
Walsingham  listened  attentively  throughout  the 
recital.  Anxious,  as  she  was,  to  know  all 
about  it — to  hear  how  he  had  come  down  to  the 
depths  he  was  in  now — she  could  not  avoid  let- 
ting her  mind  wander.  Her  attention  would 
lapse  perpetually,  and  she  would  find  herself 
thinking  of  the  life  of  love  and  comparative 
leisure  and  literary  ease  he  had  led  down  at 
the  little  village  when  her  first  engagement  had 
been  made.  She  could  but  think  of  this,  and 
compare  it  with  this  dismal  room,  which  even 
the  rich  roses  could  not  brighten — this  room, 
rife  with  evidences  of  his  penury — this  room, 
in  which  his  life  seemed  doomed  to  ebb  away. 
The  contrast  would  have  been  saddening  to  any 
woman ;  to  one  of  Bella's  temperament,  it  was 
nearly  maddening. 

When  the  story  of  how  he  had  met  with  and 
married  Marian  had  been  told,  they  spoke  of 
his  book — of  that  "Never  a  Chance"  which 
she  had  read  with  a  sickening  interest,  feeling 
it  to  be  partly  a  reflection  of  its  author's  life. 
He  mentioned  it  in  a  tone  that  strove  to  be 
slighting  at  first;  but,  with  a  woman's  quick- 
ness, she  discovered  that  he  had  a  little  pleasure 
in  it  still,  and  she  fanned  that  pleasure  as  only 
a  woman  can. 

"  Everybody  is  speaking  of  it,"  she  said,  with 


the  polite  and  surely  pardonable  deception  that 
living-kindness  is  apt  to  attempt  to  practise 
upon  tyros  in  the  craft  sometimes — "  everybody 
is  speaking  about  it,  and  I  see  it  so  well  men- 
tioned by  the  reviews." 

"  Yes,  it's  gone  into  a  third  edition ;  but  that 
means  nothing;  and  several  of  the  dailies  have 
gone  into  raptures  over  it,  which  means  less," 
he  replied,  with  assumed  indifference.  "  I 
shall  do  better  than  'Never  a  Chance'  by- 
and-by." 

An  eager  look  came  over  his  pallid  face  as 
he  said  it,  and  his  eyes  kindled  with  such  a 
terribly  bright  fire  that  the  blinding  tears  came 
into  Bella's  eyes.  It  was  hard  for  her  to  hear 
him  say  that,  and  to  see  him  wasting  away  so 
surely  and  so  fast.  Whatever  her  sins  towards 
him,  grant  that  she  was  sufficiently  punished 
for  them  now. 

"And  directly  he  makes  a  great  deal  of 
money  by  his  books,  we  are  going  away  to  live 
in  the  country — ain't  we,  Stanley?"  Marian 
asked. 

"  Somewhere  near  us,  I  hope,"  Bella  sug- 
gested. And  then  the  idleness  of  her  hope, 
the  bitter  mockery  of  it,  the  futility  of  it,  struck 
her  with  a  hard,  stunning  force:  it  is  so  bad 
when  pain  ceases  to  be  sharp  and  stinging,  and 
becomes  crushingly  weighty  and  dull !  Bella 
could  not  sit  under  hers  any  longer,  so  she  rose 
abruptly,  saying — 

"  May  I  come  again  to-morrow  with  more 
roses  ?" 

They  both  said  "  Yes,"  in  a  tone  that  told 
her  what  a  gleam  of  sunshine  in  the  darkness 
of  their  lives  her  presence  was  to  them.  Then 
she  bade  them  adieu,  and  drove  home,  bitterly 
lamenting  that  she  had  been  surprised  into  giv- 
ing a  promise  of  keeping  Claude  in  the  dark  as 
to  Stanley's  state  and  Stanley's  straits. 

Perhaps  it  would  place  poor  Stanley  Yillars 
in  a  more  noble  and  exalted  light  before  the 
reader  if  I  said,  on  Bella's  departure  he  dis- 
burdened himself  to  his  wife  of  the  secret  of 
that  engagement  the  rupture  of  which  had 
ruined  him.  But  I  cannot  say  that  he  did, 
since,  in  fact,  he  did  nothing  of  the  kind ;  and 
I  hold  him  to  be  right  in  thus  maintaining 
reserve  on  a  point  which  it  could  do  no  manner 
of  good  to  make  public. 

There  is  probably  a  closed  closet  in  every 
man's  heart — a  little  cell  that  may  not  be  dark 
as  the  suspicious  are  apt  to  think  it,  but  that  is 
simply  closed  reverently  in  order  to  keep  out 
prying  eyes.  Why  should  that  closet  be  un- 
locked and  ransacked  for  the  benefit  of  one 
who  is  occupying  or  about  to  occupy  the  rest 
of  the  heart  of  which  this  cell  is  now  but  an 
unimportant  corner?  Whether  the  one  who 
filled  it  once  be  dead  or  "only"  gone  away,  she 
should  at  least  be  nameless  to  the  new  love, 
who  will  be  wise  if  she  never  search  for  the 
little  key  that  may  open  the  door  of  the  closet 
a  man  seems  disposed  to  keep  closed. 

At  any  rate,  Stanley  Yillars  was  not  the 
style  of  man  who  opens  his  closet  needlessly. 
Had  the  girl  he  married  been  of  his  own  rank 
in  life,  she  would  probably  have  heard  about 
the  Bella  Yane  episode — heard  of  it  as  one 
hears  of  such  things  every  day,  carelessly. 
But  since  she  had  known  nothing  of  it  before, 
his  tenderness  for  her — a  tenderness  that  was 


HO 


ON  GUARD. 


less  than  love,  perhaps,  but  more  than  friend- 
ship— determined  him  on  keeping  it  from  her 
still,  on  keeping  silence  and  the  closet  closed. 

I  said  that  Bella  went  home  bitterly  lament- 
ing having  been  surprised  into  giving  a  pro- 
mise to  Stanley  of  keeping  Claude  in  the  dark. 
She  bitterly  lamented  something  else  also, 
which  was  the  loss  of  that  belief  in  the  good 
that  is  in  all  men,  which  Stanley  had  once  pos- 
sessed. It  was  gone  from  him  now.  It  was 
patent  to  her  in  everything  he  wrote,  and  said, 
and  looked,  that  a  mighty  distrust  had  come  in 
its  place — a  distrust  that  was  so  hard,  bitter, 
and  deep,  that  it  poisoned  all  it  dwelt  upon. 
Remorsefully  she  thought  about  it,  for  his  eyes 
had  silently  questioned  her  when  she  was 
reproaching  him  with  it  once,  during  her 
visit. 

"  How  could  it  different  be? 
Since  thou  hast  been  pouring  poison 
O'er  the  bloom  of  life  for  me  I" 

Grace  had  had  a  pleasant  morning's  shop- 
ping, and  was  very  satisfied  with  the  result  of 
her  labours,  when  Bella  met  her,  before  dinner. 
Miss  Harper  appeared  to  have  quite  got  over 
the  little  difference  of  the  day  before.  She  had 
that  great  art  of  being  able  to  seem  as  if  she 
had  not  only  entirely  forgiven,  but  entirely  for- 
gotten— a  thing  which  renders  lymphatic  wo- 
men dangerous  to  deal  with.  Bella,  on  the 
contrary,  was  one  of  those  unfortunates  who 
cannot  forget  being  intentionally  offended  im- 
mediately, however  it  may  be  about  forgiving. 
So  now  she  met  Miss  Harper  a  little  more  coldly 
than  a  wary  woman  would  have  done,  and 
suffered  Miss  Harper  to  perceive  that  silence 
would  be  agreeable  to  her.  She  only  addressed 
one  question  to  Grace  during  dinner,  in  fact, 
which  was — 

"  You  went  out  with  Lady  Lexley  this  morn- 
ing, I  suppose  ?"  To  which  Grace  replied — "  No, 
dear  Mrs.  Walsingham ;  by  myself — I  preferred 
it." 

"That  was  rather  strange,  I  think."  Bella 
rejoined.  Then  she  forgot  the  subject,  and 
began  wondering  how  she  could  at  the  same 
time  be  true  to  Stanley  and  to  Claude. 


CHAPTER  XLIII. 

VERY    SORROWFUL. 

EITHER  the  new  novel,  "Never  a  Chance,"  was 
having  a  tremendous  run,  or  Mr.  Mudie  had 
taken  a  very  insufficient  number  of  copies. 
Whatever  the  cause,  the  result  was  that  the 
subscriber  who  was,  perhaps,  most  interested 
in  the  work,  could  not  get  the  third  volume  the 
day  she  wanted  it. 

"It's  really  very  annoying,"  Bella  said,  when 
they  were  back  in  the  drawing-room  after  din- 
ner ;  "  too  annoying!  You're  sure  you've  been 
more  than  once  for  it,  Hill?" 

Hill,  standing  at  ease  in  the  doorway,  was 
very  sure  he  had  been  more  than  once. 

"Very  annoying  indeed,"  his  mistress  re- 
peated in  a  thoroughly  vexed  tone;  "a  perfect 
nuisance!  I  wanted  it  particularly  to-night. 
However!" 

This  "however"  was  intended,  as  the  word 


at  the  end  of  a  touchy  sentence  is  usually  in- 
tended, to  terminate  discussion,  namely,  and  to 
be  taken  as  a  declaration  of  the  speaker's  feel- 
ing the  futility  of  saying  more  about  it. 

But  Hill  had  been  in  the  disappointed  lady's 
service  many  years,  and  he  took  an  old  servant's 
interest  in  whatever  interested  her.  He  never, 
by  any  chance,  omitted  to  look  for  that  special 
paragraph  in  the  advertisement-sheet  of  the 
Times — "  Notice.  The  new  novel,  '  Never  a 
Chance,'  at  all  the  libraries" — in  these  days. 
He  almost  took  a  personal  pride  in  it,  pointing 
it  out  to  the  select  in  the  servants'  hall,  and 
dwelling  upon  it  as  upon  a  work  in  which, 
some  way  or  other,  he  had  a  share.  Many  had 
been  the  surreptitious  glances  he  had  given  to 
the  contents  of  the  two  first  volumes  at  odd 
moments,  while  his  mistress  had  kept  them  near 
her  favourite  couch,  to  be  at  hand  the  instant 
she  was  seated.  And  the  fact  of  the  third 
volume  being  unattainable  mst  now  was  to  the 
full  as  distressing  to  him  as  n  was  to  her.  For 
a  very  tender  heart  beat  beneath  that  plush, 
and  the  plight  in  which  the  heroine  was  left  at 
the  end  of  the  second  volume  was  sorely  harass- 
ing to  his  feelings.  So  now,  when  his  mistress 
said  "however,"  in  a  very  dejected,  disap- 
pointed tone,  he  conceived  an  idea,  and  deli- 
vered himself  of  it  with  surprising  rapidity — 

"  There's  the  large  library  at  Knightsbridge, 
Ma'am.  No  doubt  it  might  be  got  there." 

"  Yqu  can't  get  it  from  Westerton's  any  more 
than  from  Mudie's,  at  night." 

"  It  might  be  tried.     Shall  I  go,  ma'am  ?" 

"Yes;  I'm  very  anxious  for  it.  Manage  it 
if  you  can,  Hill,"  Bella  replied,  looking  stead- 
fastly at  Miss  Harper,  who  was  trying  to  look 
grieved  at  such  a  perverted  taste,  and  failing. 
On  which  Hill  departed,  leaving  his  mistress 
hopeful  about  getting  the  book,  but  rather  in- 
clined to  think  she  had  been  rash  in  bringing  it 
to  the  front  as  she  had  done  before  this  calm 
enemy. 

As  soon  as  the  man  was  gone  the  calm  enemy 
arrayed  herself  for  battle ;  in  other  words,  took 
up  some  netting,  which  she  always  had  on 
hand,  and  placed  herself  with  her  back  to  the 
light. 

"  You  seem  tired,  dear,"  she  commenced. 

"  I  am  tired,"  Bella  replied,  briefly ;  then  she 
felt  aggrieved  at  her  fatigue,  which  was  purely 
mental,  being  noticed,  and  added,  "  What  makes 
you  think  me  so?" 

"You  look  so  pale  and  harassed;  besides, 
your  craving  for  the  book  is  a  sign  that  you're 
not  up  to  doing  anything  better  than  reading 
it." 

Bella  gave  a  little  gasping  sigh.  She  was 
beginning  to  hate  Miss  Harper. 

"  Do  let  the  book  alone ! "  she  said,  almost 
angrily. 

"  Don't  be  afraid  that  I  am  going  to  reiterate 
what  I  said  about  it  last  night,  dear  !  "  she  said 
gently.  "I  have  made  my  protest.  I  have 
spoke'n  once." 

"  Well,  well,  I  know ;  don't,  don't  say  any 
more  about  it,  please." 

"  Not  about  the  book,  certainly,"  Grace  re- 
plied, blithely,  "  since  you  can't  listen  to  a  dis- 
passionate critique  on  anything  that's  written 
by  any  one  you  have  known,  but  about  the 
author— or,  rather,  about  his  sister." 


ON  GUARD. 


141 


In  spite  of  herself  Bella  made  a  small  move- 
ment indicative  of  curiosity.  She  turned  her 
head  round  slightly  towards  Miss  Harper,  and 
evidently  listened.  Miss  Harper  marked  that 
she  did  this,  and,  therefore,  kept  silence  and 
bided  her  time. 

"  "Well  ?  "  Bella  said,  interrogatively,  after  a 
minute. 

"Two,  three*— that's  right,"  Grace  said, 
counting  her  stitches  aloud.  "  I  thought  I  had 
got  into  a  mess.  What  did  you  say?  " 

"  I  didn't  say  anything — I  mean,  I  asked  you 
what  you  said,"  Bella  replied,  giving  a  glance 
of  deadly  hatred  at  the  netting, 

"  I !     I  didn't  speak,  dear." 

"I  beg  your  pardon;  you  did  just  now," 
Bella  said,  with  difficulty  restraining  her  incli- 
nation to  tell  Miss  Harper  not  to  call  her 
"dear"  any  more,  but  to  borne  into  an  open 
field  and  fight  it  out. 

"  What  did  I  say  ?  "  Grace  asked,  artlessly. 
How  odious  a  frank  manner  is  when  we  see 
behind  it,  and  discern  the  treachery  it  seeks  to 
mask.  Bella  saw  behind  the  artlessness  now; 
but  the  clearness  of  vision  would  do  her  small 
service,  she  began  to  fear. 

"  What  did  you  say  ?  as  if  you  had  forgotten 
already.  Why,  something  about  Mr.  Stanley 
Villars'  sister  that  you  want  to  tell  me,  and  I 
want  to  hear." 

"  Oh-o !  Oh-o !  "  Grace  said,  with  a  prolonged 
sound  on  the  "  o  •'  that  was  meant  to  express 
how  very  unimportant  the  whole  thing  was  to 
her.  "  Oh-o !  yes,  to  be  sure ;  she's  going  to 
be  married." 

"  Florence  ?  "  She  asked  it  with  a  blending 
of  relief  and  amazement.  There  was  balm  in 
this  at  least,  that  the  sister  should  be  able  to 
bury  her  dead  and  be  happy,  though  the  bro- 
ther had  been  unable  to  so.  Memories  of  Den- 
ham  days— of  the  days  when  Florence  had 
loved  Claude,  and  let  her  love  be  seen — came 
back  to  Claude's  wife  now,  as  she  uttered  the 
single  word  "  Florence." 

"  Yes,  Florence  is  her  name ;  a  very  pretty 
girl,  but  not  too  clever,  I  understand.  That's 
rather  well  though,  as  the  man  she's  going  to 
marry  is  not  too  clever  either." 

"  Her  brother  doesn't  know  it !  "  Bella  said 
hastily,  and  then  Grace  glanced  sharply  at  her, 
and  she  felt  that  she  had  made  a  mistake,  and 
faltered. 

"  I  mean,  does  her  brother  know  of  it?  "  she 
said,  blushing,  and  trying  to  keep  the  colour 
down  by  speaking  very  distinctly ;  as  if  any- 
thing would  keep  the  colour  down  in  a  woman's 
face  when  she  has  made  a  false  step,  and  is  lia- 
ble to  be  found  out.  "  I  mean,  does  her  bro- 
ther know  of  it  ?  " 

"  Of  course  you  meant  that,  for  how  should 
you  know  that  he  didn't  know  of  it,  not  having 
seen  him,"  Miss  Grace  replied,  letting  each 
word  fall  steadily  on  her  listener's  ear.  "No, 
I  don't  suppose  Mr.  Chester  has  thought  it 
necessary  to  have  an  official  communication 
made  to  Mr.  Stanley  Villars.". 

"  Who's  Mr.  Chester  ?"  Bella  asked.  She  felt 
that  there  was  animus  against  Stanley  in  these 
speeches  which  Grace  Harper  let  fall.  She  felt 
that  there  was  animus ;  but  after  all  she  was 
moving  in  the  dark,  being  utterly  at  a  loss  to 
account  for  it  in  any  way. 


"Mr.  Chester  is  the  man  Miss  Villars  is  going 
to  marry." 

"Do  you  know  him?" 

"  I  have  met  him  two  or  three  times.  Lord 
Lesley  knows  him  very  well.  He's  such  a 
booby." 

"  Poor  Florence !"  Bella  cried,  warmly.  "  You 
don't  mean  that,  do  you,  Grace  ?" 

"  Well,  I  do  mean  it.  Funny,  isn't  it,  my 
giving  you  news  of  the  Villarses  ?  Oh !  and 
I'll  tell  you  something  else,  too.  Don't  picture 
your  pet  author  pining  in  solitude.  He's  doing 
nothing  of  the  kind." 

She  laughed  as  she  said  it.  Laughed  with  a 
wicked  meaning,  that  shot  like  a  bolt  of  ice 
through  Bella's  frame.  Yet  Mrs.  Claude  fancied 
that  the  promise  he  had  extorted  from  her 
bound  her  to  keep  his  secret  and  sit  silent  when 
he  was  aspersed.  A  sentence  or  two  of  the 
truth  would  have  stopped  the  persecution  she 
was  enduring  from  innuendo,  and  left  her  nothing . 
to  fear.  But,  like  a  woman,  she  was  over  hon- 
ourable in  the  wrong  place,  and  so  harm  came 
of  it. 

As  Grace's  wicked  laugh  died  away,  Hill 
came  in,  radiant  with  success,  and  with  the 
book,  the  coveted  third  volume,  in  his  hand. 
Then  Bella  took  it,  and  with  a  faint  hope  that 
she  might  stop  the  conversation,  and  put  an  end 
to  what  would  have  sounded  to  her  like  insult- 
ing hints,  had  she  been  able  to  fix  a  motive  for 
them  on  Grace,  said — 

"  You  must  excuse  my  talking  any  more,  now 
I  have  got  my  book.  I  am  tired,  and  I  want 
to  read.  After  tea  I'll  play." 

' '  Certainly,  I'll  excuse  you,  dear.  Just  wait 
one  moment  though.  Of  course  I  couldn't  tell 
you  before  Hill,  but  Mr.  Stanley  Villars  has 
gone  down  indeed !  He's  leading  an  awful  life, 
awful !  Isn't  it  shocking  ?" 

"I  don't  believe  it,"  Bella  said,  with  a  sick 
qualm  at  her  heart.  "  Who's  your  informant  ?" 

"Lady  Villars  herself,"  Grace  said,  quietly. 
"I  forgot  to  tell  you  I  met  her  this  morning." 

"  I  thought  you  didn't  know  her." 

"No  more  I  did  before  to-day,  but  Fred 
Chester  was  with  her,  and  he  introduced  me. 
You  see  he  hunts  down  about  us,  so  he  intro- 
duced me  to  Lady  Villars  and  his  fair  betrothed. 
It's  always  pleasant,  if  people  are  likely  to 
meet  in  the  country,  to  have  met  first  in  town, 
isn't  it?" 

Grace  was  relapsing  into  the  old  stolid  sim- 
plicity, but  Bella's  belief  in  this  quality  was 
shaken  now. 

"It's  strange  you  shouldn't  have  mentioned 
all  this  to  me  before,  as  you  are  staying  with 
me,"  Mrs.  Claude  said,  with  a  slight  air  of  the 
injured  hostess  about  her. 

"Yes,  it  always  does  seem  so  mean  not  to 
say  where  one  has  been,  and  whom  one  has 
seen,  doesn't  it?"  Grace  asked,  innocently. 

"  It  also  sounds  strangely  that  Lady  Villars 
should  have  reposed  a  confidence  in  you  im- 
mediately. What  did  Florence  say  when  Lady 
Villars  told  that— that  falsehood  about  Stan'tey  ?" 

;<  Miss  Villars.  and  Mr.  Chester  had  moved  to 
another  counter — they  didn't  hear  it ;  after  all," 
race  continued,  in  an  explanatory  tone,  "  it 
wasn't  a  confidence.     I  said  I  was  staying  with 
you,  and  then  we  spoke  of  other  things." 

"Suppose  we  speak  of  other  things  now," 


142 


ON  GUARD. 


Bella  rejoined,  with  a  lightness  she  was  far  from 
feeling.  She  scented  danger,  or,  if  not  danger, 
at  least  difficult}',  of  some  sort  or  other,  but  she 
did  not  know  from  which  quarter  to  expect  it ; 
she  was  far  from  sure  as  to  whether  she  feared 
it  for  herself  entirely,  even. 

"I  wish  I  had  written  to  dear  Claude  before 
I  went  there  yesterday,"  she  thought;  "  I  should 
have  told  him,  and  then  there  would  have  been 
an  end  of  it;  now  I  don't  know  what  to  do." 

After  this  she  was  suffered  to  peruse  her 
hardly-gained  volume  in  peace,  but  there  was 
no  pleasure  in  the  perusal.  She  was  haunted 
the  whole  time  by  an  uneasy  feeling  of  having 
been  indiscreet,  and  of  therefore  being  on  the 
high  road  to  mischief — a  feeling  that  very  for- 
tunately pervades  the  breast  of  every  conscien- 
tious woman  whenever  she  is  guilty  of  that 
which,  if  less  than  a  crime,  is  unquestionably 
more  than  a  folly — concealment  and  secresy. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  had  a  burning  de- 
sire the  following  morning  to  ask  Miss  Harper 
when  she  was  going,  and  to  hint  that  she  need 
not  stand  upon  the  order  of  her  departure,  but 
take  it  at  once.  However,  hospitality  is  a 
sacred  thing.  This  well-reputed  young  woman, 
with  the  colossal  power  of  making  herself  un- 
pleasant faultlessly,  had  been  entrusted  to  her 
charge;  therefore  she  must  keep  the  precious 
deposit  until  time,  or  chance,  or  something 
equally  kind,  relieved  her  of  it. 

"  "When  Claude  comes  back,  I'll  confess  to 
him  that  I  hate  her,  and  her  thick  white  skin," 
Bella  thought  to  herself.  "  Oh  !  good  gracious ! 
the  Markham  was  bad  enough,  but  she  was 
better  than  this!" 

Miss  Harper  really  was  like  a  huge  white 
elephant  upon  her  hands.  Grace  was  just  one 
of  those  "fine"  creatures  that  when  hated  at 
all,  are  hated  with  a  tall,  fat  hatred  that  cor- 
responds with  their  bulk,  and  is  a  wearisome 
burden  to  the  feeler  of  it.  Miss  Harper  was 
ponderous,  mentally  and  bodily,  when  once  you 
regarded  her  as  other  than  a  vast  expanse  of 
harmless,  well-meaning  white  flesh. 

For  two  hours  and  a  half  after  breakfast,  Mrs. 
Claude  "Walsingham  sat  and  loathed  her  guest 
and  her  guest's  netting.  The  round,  well- 
covered  white  fingers  caught  her  eyes  and 
chained  them,  turn  which  way  she  would.  Had 
the  girl  been  awkward  with  these  fingers,  or 
quick  with  them — had  they  been  other  than  the 
subtly  slow,  unvarying-in-purpose  things  they 
were,  Bella  could  have  borne  them  better.  As 
it  was,  they  acted  on  her  nerves  as  organ-grind- 
ing or  street  ballad-singing  does  on  mine  and 
yours,  fellow-sufferer  from  metropolitan  har- 
mony. They  made  her  feel  that  she  couldn't 
sit  still,  and  that  there  was  no  relief  to  be  gain- 
ed by  motion,  and  that  anything  on  earth  would 
be  preferable  to  that  combination  of  white  cot- 
ton and  whiter  hands.  They  made  her  wish 
that  Miss  Harper  ended  at  her  throat  like  a 
cherub.  They  wrought  her  up  into  a  highly 
nervous  frame  of  mind,  in  fact,  in  which  she 
went  forth  once  more  to  see  Stanley  Villars. 

She  found  Mrs.  Stanley  in  tears  in  the  passage 
when  she  arrived,  and  she  took  the  poor  little 
baby-faced  beauty,  who  was  learning  this  world's 
sharp  lesson  of  sorrow  so  early,  to  her  warm, 
womanly  heart,  literally  as  well  as  figuratively. 
She  put  her  arms  round  the  girl  and  held  her 


within  them  closely,  never  thinking  of  Mnriau 
as  other  than  of  one  to  whom  Stanley  was  dear, 
and  who,  she  trusted,  was  dear  to  Stanley. 

"  I'm  so  glad  you're  come !"  Marian  sobbed. 
"Oh  1"  I'm  so  glad  you're  come!" 

"  "What  is  it — tell  me  ?"  Bella  asked  sooth- 
ingly. "  How  is  your  husband  ?  See !  I  have 
brought  him  grapes  with  the  roses  to-day !" 

Marian  looked  at  the  basket — the  basket 
Bella  had  arranged  with  her  own  hands — of 
grapes,  and  mosses,  and  roses.  It  was  very 
pretty — very  pretty,  indeed ;  but  the  sight  of 
it  evidently  brought  no  comfort  to  Marian 
to-day. 

"  Shall  we  go  in  to  him  ?"  Bella  suggested, 
trying  to  edge  her  way  out  of  the  passage, 
which,  by  reason  of  being  partially  blocked  up 
with  all  the  rubbish  that  had  accumulated  dur- 
ing the  whole  term  of  their  residence,  was  not 
a  pleasant  place  to  stand  in. 

"It's  no  use,"  Marian  said,  rocking  her  head 
backwards  and  forwards  on  her  shoulders,  dole- 
fully. 

"Why  no  use?"  Bella  asked,  in  a  whisper. 

"He's  gone  o — out!"  Marian  said,  getting  on 
her  feet,  and  relapsing  into  the  manner  of  her 
sex  and  time  of  life,  by  trying  to  smoothe  her 
hair  and  adjust  her  belt  and  collar  simulta- 
neously. 

"  Gone  out !"  Bella  repeated  after  her.  Then 
Mrs.  Walsingham  walked  in  and  sat  down  on 
the  couch  where  Stanley  had  been  lying  the 
day  before.  "  Gone  out — in  the  state  he  is  in  1" 

"  He's  ever  so  much  worse  to-day  !"  Marian 
said,  piteously;  "he  was  ever  so  much  worse 
after  you  left  yesterday.  He  would  sit  up,  all  ] 
coudl  say;  and  then  it  was  nothing  but  drink  and 
write,  drink  and  write,  all  day,  and  all  night, 
till  he's  half  mad,  I  think!" 

"Do  you  know  where  he  is  gone?"  Bella 
asked — not,  in  truth,  with  any  real  desire  for  in- 
formation respecting  his  destination,  but  simply 
because  she  felt  that  it  would  be  better  for  them 
both  that  there  should  be  speech,  than  that 
silence  should  reign. 

"I  don't  know — perhaps  down  to  the  office, 
or  up  to  Mr.  Bligh's;  shall  we  go  and  see?" 
Marian  said  eagerly.  It  seemed  to  her  quite  in 
the  order  of  things  that  the  pair  of  them  should 
forthwith  form  an  expedition,  and  start  in  search 
of  Stanley,  and  bring  him  back  bodily  when 
found ;  but  it  did  not  seem  in  the  order  of 
things  to  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham. 

"  We  can  send  my  man  with  a  note,  that 
you  shall  write,  to  either  of  those  places  you 
speak  of,"  Bella  said,  "and  I  will  wait  here 
with  you  till  he  comes  back.  What's  the 
office  ?" 

"  His  newspaper  place.  He  would  be  sure 
to  go  there,  if  he  could  get  as  far ;  but  he  lost 
so  much  blood  last  night  I" 

"  Lost  so  much  what  V  Bella  asked,  with  a 
tremble  in  her  tone  that  told  of  the  pain  she 
felt.  "  Lost  so  much  what  ?" 

"Blood!  Oh,  I  didn't  tell  you  that  he 
broke  a  blood-vessel !  It  is  all  so  miserable, 
Mrs.  Walsingham ;  there  is  such  a  lot  of  it  to 
tell,"  Marian  said,  putting  up  her  hands,  and 
hiding  the  light  of  day  from  her  pale-worn 
young  face. 


ON  GUARD. 


143 


CHAPTER  XLIY. 

A   TRIO   OP  MATRONS. 

POOR  BELL'A  !  She  wanted  so  much  to  be 
'"good,"  very,  very  good  now,  and  to  make 
everything  pleasant  for  all  in  whom  she  was 
interested.  But  the  time  seemed  past  for  doing 
this.  It  was  "  too  late  "  to  make  amends. 

Her  heart  ached  with  a  gnawing  anguish 
that  is  only  known  to  those  who  feel  they  have 
been  guilty,  as  she  sat  there  in  that  dingy  room, 
and  thought  of  Stanley  Yillars,  and,  shudder- 
ingly,  of  the  broken  blood-vessel.  She  knew 
so  well — for  she  was  a  quick-feeling,  sympathe- 
tic woman — how  this  last  evil  had  been  caused. 
Mental  exertion  and  mental  pain  had  strained 
some  delicate  fibre;  and  the  tide  of  life  had 
rushed  out,  and  would  be  liable  to  rush  out  at 
any  moment. 

To  say  that  she  was  very  sorry,  very  misera- 
ble, for  all  this,  would  not  express  to  you  a 
tithe  of  what  such  a  woman  as  Bella  suffers 
under  such  circumstances.  The  wages  of  her 
fault  were  not  paid  to  herself;  they  were  paid, 
seemingly,  to  the  one  against  whom  the  fault 
had  been  committed.  She,  the  sinner,  was  in 
purple  and  fine  linen,  while  he,  the  sinned 
against,  was  in  sackcloth  and  ashes. 

The  sense  of  her  own  helplessness  in  the 
matter  depressed  her,  and  made  her  appear  so 
far  less  bright  a  woman  than  Marian  had 
hitherto  deemed  her  new  friend  to  be.  There 
had  been  previously  an  amount  of  warmth, 
earnestness,  force,  and  brilliancy,  about  Mrs. 
Claude  Walsingham :  and  these  things  are  cal- 
culated to  give  the  casual  observer  the  idea 
of  carrying  all  things  before  them.  Marian 
had  imagined  all  manner  of  good  resulting  from 
the  dawning  of  Bella.  But  now  Bella  looked 
overcast — overcast  as  any  common  mortal,  who 
wasn't  full  of  beauty  and  vigour,  might  have 
looked.  Marian  stood  looking  at  her  with  a 
vague  sense  of  disappointment,  as  she  sat  on 
•the  couch,  doing  no  more,  and  making  things 
no  better,  than  any  other  woman. 

At  last  the  wife  spoke,  and  her  words  were 
wise,  with  the  wonderful  wisdom  of  love. 

"  Mrs.  "Walsingham.  could  you  help  me  to 
find  out  his  sister?  Never  mind  what  they 
say  of  me,  or  think  of  me.  I  ought,  as  he 
won't  do  it,  to  find  out  his  sister,  and  tell  how 
ill  he  is." 

"  I  can  take  you  to  her,"  Bella  replied,  start- 
ing up ;  "I  will  take  you  at  once." 

" Is  it  very  far ?  should  we  be  long  away?" 

"  We  could  go  there  and  tell  Florence  all  she 
need  know,  and  be  back  in  an  hour,"  Mrs. 
"Walsingham  replied.  "It  is  Stanley's  doing, 
you  know.  He  has  cut  himself  off  from  his 
family.  They  would  never  have  left  him  in 
the  lurch." 

"  He  had  some  good  reason  for  it,  I  think," 
Marian  answered,  putting  on  a  shawl  that  was 
lying  on  the  table  as  she  spoke.  "  He  has  not 
turned  to  what  he  is  now  for.  any  little  thing, 
I'm  sure.  Sometimes,  when  he  is  quite  himself, 
I  seem  to  see  what  he  must  have  been  before 
he  had  his  grief.  You've  known  him  a  long 
time ;  do  you  know  what  changed  him  ?" 

The  question  was  asked  in  perfect  simplicity 
and  good  faith,  but  the  questioned  shrank 


within  herself  as  she  heard  it.  She  did  know, 
God  help  her  1  The  knowledge  of  it  was  the 
cross  she  had  to  bear.  She  did  know ;  and,  as 
she  hoped  and  prayed  to  serve,  she  dared  not 
tell  his  wife. 

"H#  has  not  got  on  well;  I  suppose  that's 
it."  She  tried  to  say  it  steadily,  but  her  voice 
shook. 

"  And  his  marriage  has  kept  him  back  more, 
hasn't  it?"  Marian  asked  mournfully.  "But  he 
did  tell  me  once  that  he  was  glad  he  married 
me.  I  wish  he  hadn't,  if  it  has  harmed  him ;  I 
wouldn't  have  harmed  him  for  the  world." 

The  girl  was  weeping  wearily  before  her  sen- 
tence closed ;  and  wearily  the  lady,  who  knew 
the  truth  so  well,  answered — 

"  You  are  not  the  one  who  has  harmed  him  ; 
the  harm  was  done  before  he  knew  you." 

"  How  do  you  know  ?" 

The  sudden  cessation  of  Marian  Yillars'  tears, 
the  quick  glance  she  flashed  out  through  her 
wet  eyelashes,  put  Claude  Walsiugham's  wife  on 
her  guard  at  once.  She  remembered  that  she 
was  Claude  Walsingham's  wife,  and  that  to  re- 
proach or  point  to  herself  as  unworthy  would 
be  to  reproach  and  ask  for  condemnation  for 
him.  She  gulped  down  the  desire  to  make  a 
clean  breast  of  it,  which  had  almost  overcome 
her  when  Marian  so  piteously  bewailed  her  own 
supposed  share  in  Stanley's  downfall ;  and  re- 
plied quietly — 

"Didn't  you  tell  me  yourself  how  you  found 
him  first  ?  His  grief  and  his  restlessness  had 
come  before  then,  evidently." 

"I  suppose  they  had,"  Marian  said  softly. 
"  I'm  ready  now.  Do  you  think  I  shall  do 
good  ?" 

"  You  can  do  no  harm,"  Bella  replied ;  but 
though  she  said  this,  she  was  rather  nervous  as 
to  the  result  of  their  mission.  That  her  nervous- 
ness was  fully  shared  she  was  well  aware ;  for 
more  than  once  on  their  way  to  Sir  Gerald  Yil- 
lars', Marian  broke  the  silence  with  a  gasping 
sigh,  and  the  words — 

"I  won't  care  what  they  say,  or  look,  or 
think  of  me,  if  they'll  only  remember  that  he  is 
their  brother."  The  unaccredited  ambassador 
was  unmistakably  quailing. 

As  for  Bella,  the  only  way  in  which  she  sup- 
ported her  courage  was  by  reminding  herself 
constantly  that  she  "was  in  for  it  now."  She 
had  undertaken  it,  and  must  perforce  go  through 
with  it ;  but  she  felt  morally  sure  that,  both  by 
Claude  and  Stanley,  she  would  be  made  to  pay 
for  having  mixed  herself  up  in  the  business. 

Yet  she  had  done  no  more  than  humanity 
had  a  right  to  expect  from  her.  She  had  found 
a  man  in  dark  despair,  in  penury,  in  ill  health ; 
and  the  certain  conviction  was  hers  that  she 
had  been  the  cause  of  his  fall  into  these  things. 
However  weak  and  erring  he  had  been — how- 
ever blindly  perverse,  and  wickedly  wasteful  of 
the  good  gifts  God  had  given  him,  which  no 
woman  could  destroy — she  could  but  feel  herself 
to  have  been  the  first  cause  of  the  weakness 
and  error,  of  the  blind  perversity  and  reckless 
wastfulness.  "What  amends  she  could  it  was 
her  bounden  duty  to  make.  This  she  knew. 
She  also  knew  that  she  had  set  aboht  making  it 
in  the  wrong  way.  "  Why  didn't  I  write  and 
tell  Claude  about  it  yesterday,  before  it  grew  ?" 
she  thought,  as  she  found  herself  walking  alone 


144 


ON  GUARD. 


into  Lady  Yillars'  room,  having  thought  it  well 
that  Marian  should  wait  in  the  carriage  till  the 
ice  was  broken. 

There  were  three  of  Lady  Yillars'  sisters  in 
the  room  when  Bella  entered.  She  saw  at  once 
that  they  were  sisters,  and  shrewdly  guessed 
that  they  had  come  up  for  the  wedding. 

"  I  think  Florence  is  taking  off  her  habit," 
Lady  Yillars  said,  "or  else  she's  trying  on  some 
dresses ;  would  you  hear  ?"  addressing  one  of 
her  sisters ;  "  she'd  so  like  to  see  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham." 

"And  I  want  to  see  her  very  much,"  Bella 
commenced  in  an  agitated  tone.  "  The  fact  is 

— I  hope  you  won't  think "     She  broke 

down,  and  Lady  Yillars  began  to  smile,  and 
continued  the  same  till  her  little  short  nose  was 
almost  lost  in  the  plumpness  of  her  cheeks. 

"Think  you  late  in  your  congratulations? 
Oh,  dear,  no !  It's  a  very  recently  arranged 
affair — a  brilliant  match  for  the  dear  girl — if 
she  were  my  own  sister  I  couldn't  have  desired 
a  better." 

"  I  suppose  not,"  Bella  replied,  looking  at  the 
aforesaid  sisters.  She  did  not  mean  to  look 
sarcastic  or  anything  else  antagonistic  to  the 
"  Carrie"  interest  just  now ;  but  she  could  not 
help  feeling  and  showing  that  she  felt  that  Lady 
Yillars'  fraternal  toleration  would  not  have  been 
very  severely  taxed.  The  marriage  that  was 
pronounced  fitting  for  Miss  Yillars,  might  surely 
have  been  held  suitable  for  one  who  owed  all 
of  social  consideration  that  she  enjoyed  to  the 
Yillars  alliance. 

"I  suppose  not.  No,  it  was  not  congratula- 
tions I  came  to  offer."  Then  she  rose  from  the 
seat  she  had  taken  on  first  entering  the  room, 
and  said  hurriedly,  "  I  had  better  not  go  round 
the  subject.  Stanley  is  dying — and  his  wife  has 
come  here  with  me  (she's  in  my  carriage)  to  tell 
you  so." 

Lady  Yillars  shook  her  well -arranged  little 
head  resolutely. 

"  I'm  sorry  you've  permitted  yourself  to  be 
made  a  tool  of,"  she  said.  Then  she  turned  her 
head  slightly  over  her  shoulder,  fixed  an  obe- 
dient sister  with  her  cool  blue  eyes,  and  whis- 
pered in  a  tone  that  was  not  intended  to  reach, 
and  that  did  not  reach  Bella's  ear — "  Stop 
Florry  from  coming." 

"A  tool  of!"  Bella  repeated  the  words  warm- 
ly. She  had  anticipated  its  all  being  such  easy 
work,  as  far  as  the  Yillarses  were  concerned. 
The  sole  difficulties  she  had  foreseen  had  been 
with  Stanley  and  her  husband. 

"  A  tool  of  I  you  don't  understand " 

Lady  Yillars  stopped  her  with  an  ejaculation. 
"  Good  gracious !  how  cruelly  you  have  been 
imposed  on !"  she  cried.     "  We  know  all  about 
it— the  whole  story." 

"  And  you're  leaving  him  to  live  if  he  can, 
and  die  if  he  must?"  Bella  asked  it  with  a 
biting  scorn,  that  made  Lady  Yillars  tingle. 
"You  can't  know  the  whole  story:  your 
brother  has  struggled  till  he  can  struggle  no 
longer;  don't  stay  to  think  whether  he  has 
been  to  blame  or  not,  but  help  him  up  again." 

"I  am  sure  you  mean  well,"  Lady  Yillars 
replied,  in  the  tone  evil-disposed  people  use  to 
little  children  when  wrath  is  in  possession  of 
the  latter;  "  but  you  are  so  dreadfully  mistaken. 
It's  shameful  of  Stanley — it's  the  worst  thing  I 


have  heard  of  him  yet — to  have  let  you  mix 
yourself  up  with  the  matter!" 
"  Won't  you  see  his  wife  ?" 
"  His  wife,  Mrs.  Walsingham  1" 
""Won't  you  send  his  brother  to  him?— 
there's  his  address;"  she  forced  a  card,   on 
which  she  had  written  down  the  name  and 
number  of  the  street  in  which  Stanley  lived, 
into  Lady  Yillars'  unwilling  hand. 

"  Sir  Gerald  will  please  himself  about  going, " 
Lady  Yillars  replied,  adjusting  her  fair  plump 
face  and  insignificant  features  as  severely  as  she 
could;  "but  as  a  married  man,  I  should  hope 
he'd  have  the  good  taste  to  keep  clear  of  a  den 
of  profligacy  1" 

"  You  do  not  believe  what  you  are  saying, 
Lady  Yillars !  You  are  trying  to  harden  your 
own  heart  with  phrases."  * 

"  I  am  striving  to  save  myself  from  being  in- 
fluenced by  unhealthy  sham  emotions,"  Lady 
Yillars  replied,  spitefully. 

"Let  me  see  Florence!"  Bella  urged,  not 
heeding  the  insinuation. 

The  third  sister,  who  had  remained  quiescent 
during  the  interview,  now  rose,  and  said  she 
would  "go  and  look  for  Florry."  Presently 
she  came  back.  "Florence  is  not  come  home," 
she  said. 

Bella  gave  vent  to  an  impatient  exclamation. 
"She  is  out,  you  tell  me,  now;  but  will  you 
tell  her  what  1  came  about  when  she  comes 
home?" 

Lady  Villars  paused  for  an  instant  or  two 
before  she  answered ;  then  she  said — 

"You  can  hardly  be  serious,  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham,  in  wishing  to  bring  Miss  Yillars  into  com- 
munication with  her  brother's  mistress ;  if  you 
choose  to  risk  your  own  reputation  so  reck- 
lessly, I  must  ask  you  to  consider  Miss  Yil- 
lars'." 

"  No  woman's  reputation  will  be  endangered 
by  intercourse  with  the  poor  young  girl  Stanley 

has  married,  to  their  mutual  cost " 

"  Married!"  Lady  Yillars  struck  in  scoffingly. 
"Really,  Mrs.  Walsingham,  if  you  persist  in 
showing  yourself  all  over  London  with  her,  I 
must  beg  that  you  will  not  again  subject  me  to 
the  insultwof  having  that  creature  seen  at  my 
door.  I  wonder  Major  Walsmgham  permits  it 
— if  he  knows  anything  about  it!" 

She  added  this  last  clause  suddenly,  on  seeing 
Bella  wince  when  surprise  at  her  husband's 
"permitting  it"  was  expressed.  It  was  a  very 
telling  volley.  It  routed  the  already  nearly  ex- 
hausted enemy. 

"My  husband  will  judge  for  himself,  Lady 
Yillars." 

"  And  I  will  judge  for  myself  in  this  matter," 
Lady  Yillars  replied.  She  was  very  much 
afraid  that  Florence  might  perchance  escape 
from  her  guileless  detainers,  and  come  down 
and  find  Bella,  when  the  whole  thing  would 
explode  in  an  explanation. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  felt  that  she  was 
vanquished,  and  it  was  very  hard  for  her  to  feel 
this,  with  her  love  of  ordering  things  according 
to  her  own  inclination.     It  was  very  hard  to  go 
out  of  that  room,  and  that  little,  plump,  short- 
nosed  woman's  presence,  with  a  sense  of  defeat 
upon  her.     It  was  harder  still  to  feel  that  the  \ 
defeat  must  be  made  known  at  once  to  that    \ 
anxious  young  watcher  in  the  carriage. 


ON  GUARD. 


145 


She  made  no  pretence  of  offering  her  hand  to 
Villars.  There  was  hostility  in  her  heart 
against  that  admirable  matron,  whose  course 
of'  conduct  was  so  correct  that  all  men's  tongues 
wagged  in  praise  of  "it,"  but  never  of  " her." 
Bella  felt  that,  on  the  surface,  right  was  with 
Lady  Villars.  The  latter  was  cold-blooded, 
cold-hearted,  calculating,  cruel,  but  she  was 
very  correct.  The  diabolical  ingenuity  with 
which  she  brought  her  virtuous  scruples  to  the 
aid  of  her  aid  spite  against  Stanley,  staggered 
the  woman  in  whose  breast  resentment  and 
malice  never  obtained. 

As  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  walked  away 
through  the  hall,  after  bidding  her  hostess  fare- 
well with  a  cold  bow,  Lady  Yillars  asked  her 
sister — 

"  How  did  you  keep  Florence  away?" 
"I  told  her  there  was  a  bore  calling — that 
was  enough."  Then  the  truthful,  honest, 
young  creature  got  behind  the  curtain,  and 
peeped  out  at  Mrs.  Walsingham's  carriage  and 
contents. 

"Don't  look!  "What's  she  like?"  Lady 
Yillars  asked  in  a  breath. 

"An  impudent-looking  thing." 
"Don't  let  them  see  you  on  any  account! 
Golden  hair,  hasn't  she  ?" 

"  Yellow  1"  the  sister  answered,  scornfully. 
"Ah!  Piesse  and  Lubin  are  universal  bene- 
factors in  these  days.  I  hope  Mrs.  Walsingham 
will  get  it  from  her  husband,"  Lady  Yillars 
continued,  letting  her  words  out  in  a  series  of 
snaps. 

"So  wrong  of  her,"  the  sisters  chimed  in. 
The  sisters  had  a  habit  of  chiming  in  with  any 
sentiment,  and  of  chorussing  any  remark  the 
wealthy  married  one  of  their  band  elected  to 
make.  They  too,  young  innocents,  saw  visions 
and  dreamt  dreams ;  and  the  dreams  were  all 
of  days  of  delight  at  Gerald's  shooting-box,  in 
the  autumn ;  and  the  visions  were  more  glori- 
ous still,  of  a  season  in  town,  next  year,  under 
Carrie's  wing. 

"Wrong!  it's  idiotic!"  Lady  Yillars  said, 
sharply. 

"Yes;  what  has  she  to  do  with  it?"  the 
obliging  sister  went  on.  "How  violent  she 
was,  Carrie ;  I  expected  to  see  ever  so  much 
prettier  a  woman.  There  was  such  a  fuss  about 
her." 

"  There  was  only  a  fuss  about  her  because 
there  was  no  one  else  to  make  a  fuss  about. 
Florence  is  much  better  looking." 

Lady  Yillars  knew  that  Florence's  beauty 
was  not  precisely  the  theme  which  would  be 
most  pleasant  to  her  present  auditors.  But  she 
was  thoroughly  sisterly  in  her  treatment  of  the 
three  young  beings  whose  hopes  for  the  future 
she  held  in  her  own  plump  hand.  She  kept 
them  under  by  allusions  to  Florence's  manifold 
superiorities  over  them,  just  as  she  kept  Flo- 
rence under  by  allusions  to  the  many  losses 
they  sustained  through  her. 

"  Well,  I  don't  so  over-much  admire  Florence 
either ;  she  has  but  one  expression." 

"Ah!  but  that's  such  a  sweet  one,"  Lady 
Yillars  replied,  laughing.  "  She  never  troubles 
herself  to  be  envious  and  jealous,  and  so  her 
face  keeps  fair  and  smooth." 

Mr.   Chester  was  coming  to  Sir  G-erald's  to 
dinner  this  day,  and  whenever  he  was  asked  to 
10 


dinner  he  had  a  habit  of  coming  an  hour-and-a- 
half  too  soon  in  order,  as  he  expressed,  that  he 
"might  have  a  little  talk  with  them."  As  the 
whole  family  were  generally  engaged  in  their 
dressing-rooms  at  these  times,  he  ordinarily 
spent  this  hour-and-a-half  in  standing  about 
desolately,  and  wishing  he  "hadn't  come  so 
soon."  This  day,  however,  Lady  Villars  left 
word  that  when  he  came  he  should  be  shown 
into  the  library,  and  she  herself  told  at  once 
that  he  had  arrived. 

She  was  down  upon  him  before  he  had  had 
time  to  offer  up  one  regret  on  the  shrine  of  his 
self-importance,  for  that  he  had  come  to  soli- 
tude. She  was  cool  and  crisp,  and  entirely 
herself  again,  now;  indeed  it  was  an  attribute 
of  hers  to  be  neither  readily  nor  long  ruffled  by 
anything. 

Extending  both  hands  to  him  as  she  entered 
(how  he  wished  that  Florence  would  learn  that 
"little  way"  of  Carrie's!),  she  commenced — 

"  My  dear  Fred,  I  have  something  very  im- 
portant to  say  to  you ;  how  good  of  you  to  have 
come  in  such  nice  time." 

He  thought  that  it  was  very  good  of  himself, 
considering  how  often  he  had  done  it  before, 
and  how  invariably  melancholy  had  claimed 
him  for  her  own  in  consequence. 

"  I  haven't  even  told  my  husband  yet.  I  feel 
that  it's  so  essential  that  you  should  know  it  at 
once." 

"Nothing  gone  amiss,  eh?"  he  asked,  ner- 
vously. He  knew  very  little  of  Florence's 
character.  It  occurred  to  him  as  just  within 
the  bounds  of  possibility,  that  she  might  have 
gone  away  through  a  back  window,  with  a 
little  bundle,  to  the  arms  of  some  young  Lochin- 
var  of  whom  he  had  never  heard. 

"  No ;  nothing  gone  wrong  yet"  Lady  Yillars 
replied,  with  an  emphasis  that  made  him  feel 
that  something  had  intervened  to  stop  the  flight 
— say  a  nail,  on  which  Florence's  dress  had 
caught,  or  an  accident  on  the  railway  along 
which  she  was  speeding. 

"  No ;  nothing  gone  wrong  yet,  and  I  do  hope 
that  your  sound  sense  will  step  in  and  save  us 
from  anything  going  wrong  at  all.  You  know 
about  Stanley  ?  " 

She  asked  it  with  a  very  well  done  look  of 
pity  for  the  sinner,  and  detestation  for  the  sin. 
Fred  Chester  nodded  assent. 

"I  positively  shudder,"  Lady  Yillars  con- 
tinued, with  a  little  shake  that  was  not  nearly 
as  well  done  as  the  look — ;'  I  positively  shudder 
to  think  of  it !  " 

"So  would  any  one,"  Fred  Chester  said, 
nobly  forgetting,  in  the  pleasure  of  being  the 
chosen  witness  of  the  shudder!  ngs  of  such  a 
"charming  woman"  as  Lady  Villars,  even  to 
attempt  the  smallest  bit  of  "  business"  on  his 
own  account. 

"  The  woman !  the  creature !  forced  her  way 
here  to-day."  Lady  Villars  spoke  in  a  low  tone, 
as  though  she  were  afraid  of  polluting  the  silky 
ears  of  a  King  Charles  spaniel,  who  was  lying 
on  the  rug,  with  the  infamous  tidings. 

"  By  Jove  I  you  don't  mean  to  say  so?" 

"I  do.  Oh!  it's  shocking!  Mrs.  Claude 
Walsingham  came  with  her." 

"  Hulloa !  if  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  came 
with  her,  that  looks  rather— eh  ?— doesn't  it  ?— 
eh?" 


146 


ON  GUARD. 


"Doesn't  it  look  what?"  she  replied  sharply. 

"  Why,  rather  as  if  there  were  some  truth  in 
what  Flo  thinks — that  he's  married  1  " 

"Flo  thinks!"  she  repeated,  sarcastically. 
"You  must  know  so  much  better." 

"But  Mrs.  Walsingham  is " 

"  A  very  foolish,  rash,  impetuous  person,"  she 
interrupted,  "  and  I  fear,  I  very  much  fear,  not 
at  all  too  strait-laced  herself.  "We  shall  hear 
more  of  Mrs.  Claude  "Walsingham  one  day,  I'm 
afraid.  That's  not  the  point,  however.  "What 
do  you  wish  about  Florry  ?  " 

She  asked  him  "  what  he  wished  ?"  as  a  mat- 
ter of  form,  in  order  that  she  might  tell  her 
husband  afterwards  "  what  Fred  Chester  said." 

"I  hardly  know." 

"  Of  course  one  hardly  does  know,"  she  said, 
encouragingly.  "  I  suppose  you'll  never  suffer 
Florence  to  see  her." 

"Oh!  never!"  he  answered  with  as  much 
decision  as  an  imperfect  comprehension  of  what 
she  had  said  could  supply  him  with. 

"And  till  Stanley  gives  up  the  connection 
you'll  never  suffer  Florry  to  see  him  either  ?" 

To  this  he  replied,  "  Certainly  not!  "  and  then 
Lady  Villars,  having  got  all  she  wanted  out  of 
him,  left  him  to  his  own  devices  and  desolation, 
and  went  up  to  her  husband's  dressing-room, 
and  told  him  of  the  raid  that  had  been  made 
upon  her  respectability  that  day,  and  of  Fred 
Chester's  firm,  and  "  certainly  proper,"  determi- 
nation "never  to  let  one  of  the  lot  come  in  con- 
tact with  Flo  while  Stanley  had  that  creature 
with  him." 

"What  I  have  gone  through  to-day  no  one 
can  tell ! "  Carrie  said,  as  she  saw  her  husband 
look  black. 

"  It's  an  astonishing  thing  that  you  women 
will  always  be  deuced  hard  just  where  you 
should  be  lenient,"  he  said  angrily.  u  I  have 
known  you  so  uncommonly  gentle  in  your 
judgment  of  other  men,  and  so  wonderfully 
ready  with  the  argument  that  if  you  examine 
the  private  characters  of  all  your  male  acquain- 
tances, with  a  view  to  purging  your  list,  you'd 
soon  not  have  a  name  left  upon  it,  that  I  can't 
quite  understand  your  animosity  against  Stan- 
ley." 

"  Then  I  must  be  content  to  do  my  duty  and 
be  misjudged,  Gerald,"  she  said,  meekly.  "  I 
will  only  say  that  dear  Florry  has  been  a  great 
anxiety — thank  God,  I  shall  soon  be  relieved 
of  it !" 

"  Thank  God  that  you  will — since  you're  al- 
ways hurling  it  at  my  head,"  he  replied  without 
looking  at  her. 

Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  had  gone  back  to 
her  carriage  with  a  sense  of  her  defeat  upon 
her  strongly.  How  should  she  tell  the  hard 
truth — that  they  had  no  pity  for  and  no  faith 
in  her— to  the  poor,  worn-out  young  wife,  who 
was  waiting?  How  should  she  do  it?  How 
could  she  have  the  heart  to  do  it?  She  asked 
herself  this  question,  sadly,  and  she  could  give 
herself  no  answer. 

She  was  saved  the  trouble  of  telling  -it  in 
words.  Marian  lent  forward  eagerly  as  Bella 
came  through  the  doorway  and  down  the  steps, 
and  saw  that  in  the  face  of  her  beautiful  friend 
there  was  sorrow  and  rage,  and  little  else. 

"  They  don't  care  for  him  any  more,"  the  girl 
said,  in  a  low  harsh  voice,  as  Bella  seated  her- 


self in  the  carriage.  "  I  can  see  they  don't  care 
— they'll  let  him  die,  and  I'm  the  one " 

She  stopped  and  burst  into  tears,  and  Bella 
said — 

"I  did  not  see  his  own  brother  or  sister — I 
only  saw  his  sister-in-law.  She's  cold  and 
heartless ;  but  the  others  are  different — don't 
despair." 

But  the  girl  only  shrank  more  closely  into 
the  corner  of  the  carriage,  sobbing. 

"  Oh,  Mrs.  Walsingham !  if  I  could  only  be 
unmarried  from  him,  I'd  leave  him  at  once,  and 
— then — they'd  come  to  him ;  and  I'd — do — it — 
though  I  love  him  so." 

The  words  came  out  from  the  bursting  heart 
with  such  a  mighty  power  of  truth,  that  they 
forced  from  Bella  the  inward  prayer — 

"  God  forgive  those  who  are  trying  to  fix  the 
stigma  on  her  of  not  being  his  wife — I  can;t." 

Stanley  had  not  returned  when  they  went 
back. 

"I  shall  come  again  to-morrow,"  Bella  said, 
and  then  she  kissed  Marian,  and  tried  to  force 
something  into  the  girl's  hand.  But  Marian 
started,,  and  shook  her  head,  and  put  the  prof- 
fered gift  back. 

"No,  Mrs.  Walsingham;  not  that,"  she  said, 
shaking  her  head.  "It  may  come,  but  not  yet." 

"Oh,  Marian!  and  I  have  so  much, "Bella 
pleaded. 

"  And  I  have  nothing,  but  the  hope  that  Stan- 
ley will  never  be  brought  so  low  as  to  live  on 
charity  through  me.  Don't  be  angry,  Mrs.  Wai 
singham,  it's  all  I  have." 


CHAPTER  XLY. 

A  THUNDERSTORM. 

THE  servant  who  opened  the  door  to  Mrs.  Claude 
Walsingham  on  her  return  home  from  her  mis- 
sion of  mercy,  looked  so  pleasurably  excited 
that  Bella  naturally  felt  convinced  that  some- 
thing horrible  had  happened.  "  Master's  home, 
m'm,"  he  said,  as  his  mistress  stepped  into  the 
hall. 

"  Home  is  he  ?  where  ?"  she  asked  hastily. 

"  And  master's  father  is  dead,  m'm,"  the  man 
replied,  with  the  proud  resolve  to  be  the  one  to 
break  the  bad  news,  which  is  a  strong  passion 
in  the  breasts  of  the  lower  ten  thousand  The 
man  had  no  ill  or  any  other  feeling  connected 
with  Mr.  Walsiugham  deceased,  but  he  told  of 
that  gentleman's  death  with  an  unctuous  satis- 
faction, slightly — and  but  slightly — dashed  with 
sorrow,  that  was  refreshing  to  behold. 

Mrs.  Walsingham  started.  So  the  kindly, 
polite  old  gentleman,  her  father-in-law,  was 
dead  I  Well,  she  would  have  felt  it  very  muck 
had  she  been  down  at  the  Court  at  the  time. 
She  had  been  away  from  his  atmosphere  for 
some  months  now,  however;  so,  though  she 
started,  it  was  neither  with  great  sorrow  nor 
great  horror.  It  was  merely  with  surprise. 

"  Dead  is  he !     Where's  your  master  ?" 

11  Gone  out,  m'm.  Mrs.  Markham  came  back 
with  master." 

"  Oh,  did  she !"  Bella  said,  walking  on.  She 
did  not  ask  "  where  Mrs.  Markham  was  ?"  It 
occurred  to  her  that  she  would  know  that  soon 


ON  GUARD. 


147 


enough.  "  I  wish  Claude  had  waited  in  till  I 
came  home,"  she  thought,  as  she  went  into  her 
dressing-room,  "  then  I  could  have  told  him 
about  poor  Stanley  at  once." 

It  came  upon  her  strongly  now,  as  she  re- 
flected how  much  she  had  to  tell  "  about  Stan- 
ley," that  she  had  been  unwise  in  that  she  had 
not  written  some  of  it  to  her  husband.  It  was 
rather  a  long  story.  Not  so  much  a  long  story, 
perhaps,  as  a  difficult  story  to  tell  with  the  con- 
viction upon  her  that  a  portion  of  it  should 
have  been  told  before. 

It  lengthened  and  grew  more  intricate  as  she 
sat  there  thinking  about  it.  Lady  Yillars'  re- 
marks would  have  to  be  repeated;  and  Lady 
Villars'  remarks  and  Lady  Villars'  manner  had 
not  been  pleasant  to  Bella,  even  in  the  midst  of 
the  fervour  and  heat  of  her  philanthropic  mis- 
sion. But  now,  when  that  fervour  had  toned 
down  a  bit,  and  that  heat  had  cooled  by  reason 
of  her  having  come  out  of  the  presence  of  the 
creators  of  it,  Lady  Villars'  manners  and 
remarks  seemed  more  unpleasant  still,  and  she 
felt  that  Claude  would  be  righteously  angry  at 
his  wife  having  subjected  herself  to  them. 

There  was  an  element  in  Claude's  nature 
which  his  wife  had  always  been  conscious  of, 
without  ever  having  called  upon  herself  to  de- 
fine. It  was  an  element  which  he  kept  under 
greatly,  but  still  it  was  there.  It  was  that 
which  brought  the  red  spots  to  his  eyes  when 
anger  seized  his  soul.  It  was  a  strong,  hot, 
furious  fierceness,  in  fact,  which  could  be  very 
cruel.  He  had  given  vent  to  a  little  of  it  on 
the  occasion  of  that  fall  she  had  had  from  De- 
vilskin  under  Jack's  auspices.  "  Ah !  it  doesn't 
do  to  sit  and  think  when  one's  nervous,"  she 
said,  abruptly  starting  to  her  feet,  after  dwell- 
ing for  a  minute  or  two  on  that  incident.  "  I'll 
go  and  see  the  Markham,  and  apologise  for 
not  having  been  in  to  receive  her,  when  I 
didn't  know  she  was  coming." 

Accordingly,  Bella  having  heard  from  her 
own  maid  that  Mrs.  Markham  had  installed 
herself  in  a  suite  of  rooms  that  seemed  good  to 
her,  went  off  to  welcome  and  condole  with  her 
guest.  Went  prepared  to  fulfil  all  the  rites  of 
hospitality,  and  avert  with  kindly  words  any 
wrath,  the  seeds  of  which  might  have  been 
sown  during  her  inopportune  absence. 

Her  tap  at  the  door  was  answered  by  a 
lachrymose  "  come  in  "  from  Grace  Harper,  and 
entering,  she  found  that  young  lady  installed 
on  the  little  couch  at  the  foot  of  the  bed,  with 
a  brace  of  pearly  tears  on  her  nose,  and  a  list 
of  mourning  habiliments  to  be  procured  in  her 
hand — all  for  the  deceased  Mr.  Walsingham. 
Mrs.  Markham  was  seated  opposite  to  her 
friend,  recruiting  herselF  after  her  journey  with 
sherry  and  biscuits,  and  enlivening  the  repast 
by  giving  details  connected  with  the  "late 
mournful  event." 

"  I  am  so  grieved  to  hear,"  Bella  was  com- 
mencing as  she  hastily  advanced  towards  her 
sister-in-law;  and,  to  do  her  justice,  she  was 
grieved  the  instant  she  saw  Mrs.  Markham,  for 
Mrs.  Markham's  face  was  care-worn  and  pain- 
lined.  "I  am  so  grieved,  Ellen;  and  that  I 
should  have  been  out  too!" 

She  had  given  out  her  hand  frankly  towards 
Claude's  sister,  and  now  she  bent  her  face  for- 
ward to  greet  Mrs.  Markham  with  a  kiss.  It 


was  such  a  sweet,  glowing,  lovely  face  that  was 
extended,  that  no  man  or  woman  on  earth 
could  have  resisted  giving  it  the  salute  it  asked 
for.  Mrs.  Markham  bent  her  stiff  neck  with  a 
jerk,,  and-  brought  her  mouth  down  with  a 
bony  kiss — a  kiss  in  which  Bella  felt  nothing  so 
much  as  the  teeth — on  Mrs.  Claude's  bright 
cheek. 

""We  must  submit  to  the  Lord's  decrees," 
she  said,  as  she  brought  her  kiss  to  a  conclu- 
sion, snapping  it  off  suddenly  in  a  way  that 
seemed  to  show  that  she  inwardly  protested 
against  the  weakness  of  which  she  had  been 
guilty.  The  remark  not  being  one  that  was 
exactly  calculated  to  set  the  ball  of  conversa- 
tion rolling,  Bella  held  her  peace  .for  an  instant 
or  two,  and  then  said — 

"Yes;  I'm  so  sorry  I  was  not  at  home.  I 
wish  Claude  had  waited  for  me." 

Mrs.  Markham  reseated  herself,  and  then 
assumed  that  most  terrific  of  all  feminine  ex- 
pressions— the  mysterious.  When  a  woman 
puts  on  this,  a  home  in  the  howling  wilderness 
would  be  preferable  to  a  boudoir,  all  silk  tabo- 
ret  and  Sevres  china,  in  her  vicinity. 

"  It  certainly  would  have  been  better  had 
you  been  at  home  on  Claude's  arrival,"  Mrs. 
Markham  said  presently,  and  her  tones  were  a 
degree  and  a  half  more  mysterious  than  her 
looks.  The  stranger  on  whose  ear  they  might 
have  fallen  might  have  been  forgiven  for  ima- 
gining that  murder,  arson,  and  general  unplea- 
santness had  been  the  result  caused  by  Bella's 
absence.  "  It  would  have  been  better — much 
better,"  she  repeated,  emphatically. 

"I  hope  you've  been  made  quite  comfort- 
able?" Bella  asked,  trying  to  ignore  all  the 
disagreeable  meaning  in  her  sister-in-law's 
voice. 

"  Thank  you,  I  have,"  Mrs.  Markham  replied, 
icily. 

"  The  woman  won't  let  me  like  her,  however 
well  inclined  I  am,"  Bella  thought.  Then  she 
asked  aloud — 

"  Mind  you  command  me  absolutely,  Ellen. 
Let  me  save  you  all  trouble  about  the — about 
the  mourning,  I  mean,"  she  added  in  a  lower 
key,  touched  to  solemnity  by  her  subject. 

"  You  are  very  kind."  Mrs.  Markham  spoke 
in  a  rigid  tone.  Intuitively  Bella  felt  that 
something  had  gone  wrong. 

"Did  Claude  say  where  he  was  going?  and 
what  have  you  been  about  while  I  have  been 
out,  Grace  ?  "  Bella  asked  in  a  breath. 

Miss  Harper's  lips  parted,  but  before  she 
could  utter  a  word  Mrs.  Markham  said — 

"Claude  did  not  say  where  he  was  going. 
He  was  met  on  his  return  home,  in  grief  for  the 
loss  of  a  parent,  by  news  which  upset  him  con- 
siderably." 

"  What  was  that  news  ?  and  who  gave  it  to 
him  ?  "  Mrs.  Claude  asked  quickly. 

Mrs.  Markham  sipped  her  wine  and  crumbled 
her  biscuit,  not  "nervously" — she  was  not  the 
sort  of  woman  to  relapse  into  nervousness  on 
slight  provocation — but  tremulously.  Her  tre- 
mulousness  usually  arose  from  anger,  Bella 
knew;  and,  knowing  this,  Bella  watched  it 
somewhat  anxiously. 

"  What  was  that  news  ?  and  who  gave  it  to 
him  ?  "  Mrs.  Claude  repeated  her  question  with 
that  slight  additional  emphasis  which  betokens 


148 


ON  GUARD. 


the  birth  of  an  intention  not  to  be  trifled  with 
in  the  speaker.  It  was  very  slight  in  her  case, 
but  she,  not  being  a  gusty  or  showy-mannered 
woman,  marked  all  these  fluctuations  of  feeling 
very  delicately,  though  clearly. 

"What  the  news  was  you  will  hear  soon 
enough.  I  cannot  tell  you  who  told  it  to  him." 
Mrs.  Markham  spoke  in  a  monotone.  She 
had  told  herself  that  it  behoved  her  to  betray 
neither  anger  nor  excitement;  therefore  she 
adopted  that  tone  which  is  of  all  others  most 
calculated  to  drive  the  one  who  hears  it  into 
angry  despair.  Turbulent  violence  may  be 
endured  and  baffled;  but  calm  virulence  is 
simply  maddening  in  its  effects. 

"  Don't  torture  me  by  speaking  in  that  way," 
Bella  said  quickly.  "  Do  you  know  anything 
of  this,  Grace  ? "  she  continued,  looking  Miss 
Harper  fixedly  in  the  face. 

'  Nothing  more  than  you've  heard  from  dear 
Mrs.  Markham,"  Grace  replied,  meekly. 

Bella's  heart  swelled.  It  seemed  to  her  that 
her  husband  had  been  wanting  in  certain  attri- 
butes with  which  she  had  loved  to  endow  him, 
in  having  left  her  to  the  mercy  of  these  discreet 
women,  who  knew,  and  looked,  and  thought  all 
manner  of  things  which  they  were  too  guarded 
to  say.  Her  heart  swelled,  and  the  angry  tears 
started  into  her  eyes.  She  had  no  intention  of 
suffering  them  to  fall  in  such  company,  how- 
ever, so  she  walked  to  the  door,  saying — 

"  Since  I  can  be  of  no  assistance  to  you  now, 
I'll  leave  you  till  Claude  comes  home." 

"You  dine  at  the  old  hour,  I  suppose  ?"  Mrs. 
Markham  asked,  coldly. 

"  Yes,  the  same.  I  shall  go  and  rest  now." 
Then  she  went  off  to  her  own  dressing-room 
again,  and  coiled  herself  up  on  a  couch,  and 
tried  to  care  for  the  last  pages  of  "  Never  a 
Chance,"  and  forget  the  shadowy  doubts  that 
had  been  created  in  her  mind.  But  she  could 
do  nothing  but  move  about  restlessly,  and  wish 
that  Claude  would  come  and  say  out  the  news 
that  he  had  heard  when  he  came  home. 

He  came  at  last.  She,  starting  up  and 
throwing  down  her  book  at  the  sound  of  his 
foot  in  the  passage  which  led  down  to  her 
dressing-room,  went  forward  to  the  door  to 
meet  him.  Even  as  she  went  forward  hastily, 
her  quick  ear  detected  in  the  sound  of  his  step 
that  there  was  something  wrong. 

His  gaze  met  hers  the  instant  the  door  was 
opened,  and  the  red  spots  that  came  into  his  eyes 
when  he  was  angry  were  in  them  now,  as  they 
met  his  wife's.  He  kept  his  hand  on  the  door- 
handle still,  too,  instead  of  putting  it  round 
Bella,  as  tie  was  wont  to  put  it  when  she  had 
her  arms  round  his  neck  and  her  face  on  his 
breast,  as  she  had  them  now. 

She  had  seen  in  the  momentary  glance  she 
had  given  that  his  face  looked  pale  and  hard. 
Perhaps  he  was  grief-stricken  only,  for  he  had 
loved  his  father  well,  though  with  none  of  the 
warm,  affection  his  father  had  lavished  upon 
him.  "  Dear  Claude !  "  she  said,  and  her  voice 
was  very  soothing  and  sympathetic,  "I  am 
BO  sorry,  dear !  and  that  I  shouldn't  have  been 
in  to  hear  it  from  you  first  when  you  came." 

He  just  brushed  her  brow  with  his  lips  in 
reply,  and  then  he  moved  her  away  from  him 
and  said — 

"  Here !  let  me  get  into  the  room !  " 


She  stood  back  then,  feeling  rebuffed  and 
discomfited,  and  let  him  get  into  the  room. 
"When  he  was  in,  he  flung  himself  on  the  couch, 
irst  flinging  the  volume  that  she  had  been  read- 
ng  into  the  corner  of  the  room. 

His  doing  that  reminded  her  of  the  Stanley 
Villarses,  and  of  all  she  had  to  tell  him.  "He 
s  worn  out  with  his  journey  and  his  loss,  poor 
>oy,"  she  thought.  "It  will  take  his  mind  from 
lis  own  sorrows  a  little  if  I  tell  him  about  poor 
Stanley." 

"  Claude,  dear,  I  have  something  to  say  to 
rou,"  she  began,  sitting  down  by  his  side,  and 
aying  her  hand  on  his  shoulder.  She  gave  a 
wistful,  pleading  look  into  his  face  as  she  spoke, 
and  somehow  the  expression  recalled  the  one 
she  had  worn  the  first  night  of  their  meeting  in 
:hat  old  cathedral  town,  when  she  had  implor- 
ed him  to  remain  at  the  inn,  "  in  order  that  she 
might  feel  that  she  had  a  friend  in  the  house." 

'And  I've  something  to  say  to  you,"  he  re- 
plied, banishing  the  remembrance  of  that  ex- 
pression, with  all  its  softening  influences,  as  he 
spoke.  At  the  same  time  he  took  a  letter  from 
tiis  pocket,  and  half  opened  it,  glancing  down 
at  its  contents  in  a  way  that  seemed  to  imply 
that  it  had  some  connection  with  that  matter  on 
which  he  was  going  to  speak  to  her. 

"What  is  it,  Claude?"  she  asked;  and  her 
breath  failed  her  as  she  asked  it,  for  she,  too, 
had  glanced  at  the  half-opened  letter,  and  re- 
cognised the  characters  in  which  it  was  written 
as  being  identical  with  that  anonymous  letter 
of  which  mention  has  been  already  made. 

"  Is  it  true  that  you  have  been — by  Jove  I  I 
won't  give  you  an  opportunity  of  deceiving  me 
further,"  he  interrupted  himself,  savagely — "it 
is  true  that  you  have  been  flaunting  about  town 
with  a  couple  of — of  women  with  whom  it's  not 
too  creditable  to  be  seen,  and  picking  up  with 
nice  associates  I" 

"Claude,  stop " 

"  When  I  have  done,"  he  went  on,  ruthlessly. 
"  It's  true — I  see  it  in  your  face.  Why  the 
devil  didn't  you  attend  to  what  Miss  Harper 
said?" 

"Attend  to  what  Miss  Harper  said?"  she 
repeated  wonderingly. 

"Yes.  When  I  read  this  letter— here's  a 
pleasant  epistle  to  greet  a  fellow  the  first  thing 
after  such  an  absence  from  home  as  mine  has 
been."  He  picked  the  letter  from  his  pocket 
again  as  he  spoke,  and  flung  it  into  her  lap. 

"What  is  it  ?"  she  asked.    "  Who's  it  from  ?" 

"  It's  anonymous " 

Before  the  word  was  well  out  of  his  mouth, 
she  had  flung  the  letter  from  her  with  a  gesture 
of  loathing  and  contempt  that  was  so  genuine 
and  so  strong  that  he  paused  to  look  at  her. 
Presently  he  resumed — 

"If you'll  read  it  you'll  see " 

"If  I'll  read  it?"  she  repeated,  sorrowfully. 
"  Claude !  Can  you  ask  me  to  do  it — can  you 
believe  I  would  do  it  ?" 

"  Then  I  must  speak  to  you  about  its  con- 
tents," he  said,  sternly;  "which  may  be  more 
unpleasant  to  you  still.     It  was  to  save  you  the 
pain  of  hearing  the  truth  in  so  many  hard  words 
that  I  gave  you  the  option  of  reading  the  letter 
which  made  me  acquainted  with  it." 
"With  what?" 
"The  truth." 


ON  GUARD. 


149 


She  bowed  her  head.  "I  will  hear  it  from 
you,  Claude,"  she  said,  quietly.  She  was  re- 
membering very  vividly  now  how  remorse  had 
oppressed  her  for  having  read  an  anonymous 
slander  of  him, 

"  You  will  not  deny,  I  suppose,  that  you  have 
been  exhibiting  yourself  about  with  Lady  Lex- 
ley  in  the  park,  and  in  Regent  Street,  and  G-od 
knows  where  else  ?" 

"  Of  course  I  have  I1'  she  replied,  wonder- 
ingly. 

"  "Why  on  earth  did  you  do  it?  Why  select 
her  from  every  other  woman  under  heaven  to 
help  you  in  carrying  out  your  sentimental,  half- 
philanthropic,  imbecile  intrigue  ?" 

"I  do  not  understand  you,"  she  said,  firmly; 
but,  though  she  spoke  firmly,  her  heart  was 
very  low.  She  saw  herself-  entangled  in  the 
web  that  had  been  partially  woven  by  her  own 
absurd  reticence. 

He  rose  up  and  began  to  pace  about  the  room, 
by  way  of  keeping  his  anger  active. 

"Not  understand  me ! — you  do.  If  it's  true 
that  you  have  been  day  after  day  in  some  low 
purlieu  to  see  Stanley  Villars,  and  the  girl  he 
has  picked  up — and  you'll  scarcely  deny  that — 
you  must  understand  me." 

"  Claude,  don't  be  hard  arid  hasty.  I  will  tell 
you  all — everything,"  she  cried,  starting  up  and 
clinging  to  his  arm. 

"  By  Jove !  I  have  heard  enough  already  to 
turn  a  fellow  sick,"  he  said,  hotly.  "Here  this 
letter  meets  me  on  my  return —  " 

"And  you  regard  it  for  an  instant?  Oh, 
Claude !"  She  thought  again  of  the  one  she 
had  received ;  but  she  was  not  made  of  the  stuff 
that  strives  to  make  others  display  generosity 
by  vaunting  its  own. 

"  Regard  it  1  Well,  it  annoyed  me  preciously, 
I  confess,  to  learn  that  you  should  be  spoken 
about  at  all;  and  then  to  hear  what  I  have 
heard  since." 

"  "Will  you  tell  me  all  you  have  heard  ?  then  I 
will  defend  myself,"  she  said;  "  but  before  you 
tell  me  anything,  I  want  to  say  that  I  have  been 
to  Stanley  Villars  and  his  wife ;  and  you  must 
go  too,  for,  Claude,  he's  dying." 

Her  voice  broke  down  as  she  said  that;  it 
seemed  so  unnatural  a  thing  that  Claude  should 
be  hard  on  the  subject  of  Stanley  now. 

"Dying!  what  nonsense  you  women  talk!" 
Major  "Walsingham  said,  angrily.  Then  he  looked 
at  her,  and  softened  a  little — "Poor  girl!"  he 
said,  kissing  her,  "I  really  think  you  believe  it." 

"Believe  it!  Oh,  Claude!"  and  then  she 
poured  out  a  portion  of  her  story. 

"  The  broken  blood-vessel  is  bosh !  simply  a 
fabrication  of  the  ingenious  young  lady  who 
induced  you  to  compromise  yourself  by  taking 
her  to  Lady  Villars'.  I  was  coming  through  the 
Strand  just  now,  and  I  saw  Mr.  Stanley  reel  out 
of  some  tavern.  It's  disgusting — actually  dis- 
gusting!" 

"He  must  have  reeled  from  some  other  cause 
than  intoxication,"  she  said,  sorrowfully. 

"  He's  gone  to  the  bad  entirely,  I  tell  you, 
Bella.  It's  absurd  of  you  to  affect  to  disbelieve 
what  every  one  knows ;  he's  lost  to  every  decent 
feeling,"  he  continued,  angrily,  "or  he  would 
never  have  made  the  parade  he  has  of  being 
driven  to  despair  by  your — your  throwing  him 
over  " 


She  blenched.  "Don't  speak  of  it  in  that 
way,  Claude,"  she  said,  quickly.  "God  knows 
I  am  telling  you  what  I  firmly  believe  to  be  the 
truth,  when  I  tell  you  that  Stanley  Villars  is 
dying  now.  His  poor  wife  was  broken-hearted 
to-day — that's  why  I  took  her  to  Lady  Villars ; 
I  wanted  to  see  Florence." 

"  His  wife !  Well,  I'll  say  nothing  of  that 
part  of  it;  only  I  won't  have  you  mixing  your- 
self up  with  her.  How  on  earth  did  you  ferret 
her  out?" 

She  told  him  "how  kind  Lady  Lexley  had 
been." 

"Very  imprudent  of  you,"  he  said,  with  a 
scowl — "very  imprudent,  indeed ! — you  couldn't 
have  made  a  more  injudicious  selection  of  a 
companion  into  a  romantic  scrape  if  you  had 
tried." 

"  You  told  me  yourself  to  call  on  her,  Claude." 

"  To  call  on  her,  but  not  to  career  about  all 
over  town  with  her.  Grace  Harper  says  she 
told  you  to  be  careful— didn't  she  ?" 

"  Sketchily." 

"In  what  other  way  could  a  girl  tell  you?" 
he  asked. 

"So  she  has  been  improving  the  aspect  of 
things  in  your  eyes,  while  I  was  absent  and  un- 
defended, Claude  ?" 

He  hesitated. 

"  I  was  so  annoyed  that  I  let  Ellen  see  that 
cursed  letter,  warning  me  of  'your  impru- 
dence!'" he  said  at  last;  "  and  then  she  told 
Grace." 

"But — excuse  me,  Claude,  for  speaking  in 
such  a  way  of  your  friend — it  seems  to  me  thai 
she  had  no  right  to  discuss  my  conduct." 

"  She  tried  to  make  the  best  of  it,"  he  began. 
"  She  said  she  felt  sure  you  hadn't  done  any  of 
these  things,  as  she  had  cautioned  you  against 
doing  anything  that  might  annoy  my  family. 
Now,  Bella,  you  must  feel  conscious  that  this 
picking  up  with  Stanley  Villars  and  that  girl  is 
not  at  all  the  sort  of  thing  which  my  wife  may 
do  with  credit." 

"Claude,  I  didn't  believe  that  Stanley  has 
forfeited  his  claim  to  our  friendship  when  Lady 
Villars  said  it,  and  I  don't  believe  it  now.  He 
has  been  unhappy,  and  in  his  unhappiness  he 
has  been  reckless,  to  the  injury  of  his  health." 

"He's  a  dissipated  drunkard,"  Claude  said 
sternly. 

"Claude!  those  are  cruel  words!  Oh!  my 
dear  husband,  don't  use  them  about  Stanley; 
he's  failing  so  fast!" 

"  And  no  wonder,  when  he  drinks  at  the  rate 
he  must  to  have  been  in  the  state  I  saw  him  in, 
in  the  Strand,  to-day.  '  Failing  fast '  is  a  shal- 
low euphemism ;  he's  softening  his  brain  with 
gin  and  water." 

Major  Walsingham  believed  that  what  he  was 
saying  was  true,  otherwise  he  wouldn't  have 
said  it.  But  there  was  little  sorrow  in  his  heart 
for  this  truth.  He  forgot  his  old  friendship  for 
Stanley  now.  He  could  only  remember  that 
Stanley,  through  what  Claude  termed  "his 
cursed  maudlin  sentimentality,"  had  kept  the 
fact  of  having  been  jilted  by  Bella  fresher  in 
the  minds  of  men  than  was  desirable. 

Bella  shuddered.  "  How  you  have  changed 
to  him  !"  she  said  presently.  "  He  knew  you 
better  than  I  did !" 

"  What  did  he  say  about  me  ?"  he  asked. 


150 


ON  GUARD. 


"  He  asked  me  not  to  humiliate  him  by  beg- 
ging you  to  go  and  see  him,  as  he  felt  sure  you 
wouldn't." 

"  I  wish  he  had  had  the  decent  feeling  not  to 
try  and  link  your  name  with  his  again.  He's 
had  the  good  taste  to  keep  clear  of  his  own 
family;  I  wish  to  God  he  had  extended  his 
consideration  to  mine !" 

So  they  talked  the  subject  over,  neither  con- 
vincing the  other,  nor  being  shaken  for  an  instant 
in  their  respective  beliefs  and  opinions.  But 
Bella  was  a  woman ;  and  it  is  the  woman's  part 
to  give  up,  whether  convinced  or  not.  She 
played  her  part  very  gracefully. 

"  I  grieve  for  everything  connected  with  the 
business,  dearest  Claude;  but  I  hope  you'll 
believe  me  when  I  say  that  I  grieve  for  nothing 
so  much  as  for  having  acted  in  a  way  you 
don't  approve  of.  "Will  you  forgive  me?" 
She  looked  at  him  very  lovingly  as  she  spoke ; 
so  lovingly  that  he  bitterly  repented  him  of  his 
harshness.  She  was  not  the  type  of  woman 
to  need  it. 

"Forgive  you!  I  should  think  so!  but 
you  mustn't  perform  romantic  exploits  again, 
dear." 

"  I  won't,"  she  said ;  "  but  I  wish " 

"  There  1  not  another  word !"  he  interrupted. 
"  I  wish,  too,  all  sorts  of  things.  If  Stanley 
doesn't  drink  himself  to  death,  the  time  will 
come  when  he'll  shake  himself  clear  of  all  this 
mire,  and  be  ashamed  of  it.  Then  I'll  hold  out 
my  hand  to  him,  not  before;  and  mind  you, 
Bella,  I'll  not  have  you  do  it  either !" 

lie  was  all  the  lord  and  master,  the  man  to 
^obeyed,  without  question  or  demur,  as  he 
said  this. 

"So  be  it,  Claude,"  she  said  quite  meekly; 
love  had  thoroughly  tamed  her. 

They  separated  to  dress  then ;  but  when  she 
was  ready,  she  went  and  knocked  at  his  door, 
and  asked  him,  "  might  she  come  in  ?"  On  his 
giving  her  permission,  she  went  in  and  talked 
to  him  of  his  father's  death,  and  of  their  own 
-altered  condition. 

"Shall  you  live  much  at  the  Court?"  she 
asked. 

"Oh,  yes!  a  good  deal  "We'll  go  to  the 
Highlands  for  a  few  weeks  after  the  funeral  ? 
And  I  tell  you  what,  Bella — you  may  as  well 
ask  your  mother  to  meet  us  at  the  Court  on  our 
return,  and  stay  a  short  time  with  us." 

"  Thank  you,  dear;  that  will  be  very  nice," 
she  replied  absently. 

"  And  when  Mrs.  Vane  goes,  it  may  be  as 
well  to  give  my  mother  to  understand — very 
delicately,  you  know,  but  clearly — that  it  per- 
haps will  be  well  for  all  parties  that  there 
shouldn't  be  two  mistresses  at  the  Court,  and 
that  it  would  be  better  for  her  to  live  in  the 
village ;  you  must  do  that,  dear." 

"Very  well;  as  you  please,  Claude,"  she 
said  slowly. 

'f  Is  there  anything  the  matter  ?"  he  asked, 
advancing  towards  her  as  he  was  tying  his 
cravat.  "  Don't  think  any  more  of  our  differ- 
ence, dear.  I  have  told  you  what  I  think 
and  what  I  feel,  and  now  it's  over.  Be  a 
sensible  little  woman,  and  don't  dwell  gloomily 
upon  it." 

She  got  up  and  utterly  spoilt  the  symmetry 
of  the  bow  of  the  carefully  tied  crajat. 


"  Oh !  Claude !  "  she  moaned  sorrowfully, 
clinging  to  him,  "  I  feel  as  if  a  boat  were  going 
down  before  my  eyes !  I  wish  so  to  do  right ! 
I  wish  so  to  do  right !  and  it  is  right  to  obey 
you ;  but  my  heart  is  torn !" 

"I  should  rather  think  it  was  right  to  obey 
me!"  he  said  good-humouredly.  "You  silly 
girl !  to  go  into  heroics  for  nothing !" 

""Well,  I  won't  again,  Claude;  but  grant  me 
one  favour." 

"  What  is  it  ?" 

"  Don't  let  either  Mrs.  Markham  or  Miss 
Harper" — and  her  eyes  flashed  as  she  named 
them — "feel  that  I  am  in  the  pitiable  position 
of  a  distrusted  or  an  indiscreet  wife." 

"  What  an  absurd  girl  you  are  !" 

"  Not  so  absurd  1  Your  sister  is  your  sister, 
and  means  well  by  you,  I'm  sure.  Remember- 
ing this,  I  can  forgive,  and  but  just  forgive,  the 
insultingly  suspicious  guard  she  has  attempted 
to  mount  over  me  from  the  moment  of  my  first 
meeting  with  her.  But  that  white-faced  hyno- 
crite  has  no  such  claim  on  me ;  and  when  she 
leaves  my  house  this  time,  she  shall  never 
darken  my  doors  again." 

"This  is  absurd  prejudice,  dear,"  he  said 
carelessly;  "you'll  think  better  of  it  by-and- 
by."  Then  they  went  down  to  dinner,  and 
rather  puzzled  their  guests  by  their  demeanour 
to  one  another. 


CHAPTER  XLVI. 

DEAL  GENTLY  WITH  THE  ERRING. 

THE  majority  of  us  have  seen  a  boat  go  down. 
I  do  not  mean  that  we  have,  most  of  us,  stood 
on  a  shingly  beach,  and  looked  over  the  leaping 
waves  at  the  terrible  sight  of  a  slight  thing  of 
planks  and  spars  battling  with  the  awful,  angry 
element!  Some  of  us  have  witnessed  that 
spectacle,  and  sickened  at  it,  and  prayed  ear- 
nestly enough  to  the  great  God  of  Mercy  to 
save  us  from  a  repetition  of  it.  But  there  is 
another  and  a  sadder  wrecking — the  wrecking 
of  a  human  bark  on  the  ocean  of  life,  and  that, 
the  most  of  us  who  have  looked  at  life  with 
open  eyes  must  have  seen ! 

It  is  almost  invariably  the  most  gallant  barks 
that  fall  to  pieces  in  this  way.  They  go  out  so 
bravely !  with  such  a  gay  disregard  of  danger, 
and  the  first  rock  they  strike  upon  bruises  them 
just  sufficiently  to  admit  of  the  waters  of  bitter- 
ness welling  in,  and  then  they  fill  with  fell 
rapidity,  and  go  to  the  bottom. 

The  barks  that  rigour,  and  routine,  and  re- 
spectability— all  these  such  good  things  in  their 
way — have  wrecked !  How  many  "  hopes  of 
the  family"  have  been  court-martialed  out  of  all 
care  for  the  future  for  some  ward-room  joke  or 
mess-table  excess  that  rigour  would  not,  or  rou- 
tine dared  not  overlook.  The  boyish  escapade 
may  be  no  very  dark  thing  in  itself:  just  a 
vinous  defiance  of  a  superior  officer ;  just  a  bac- 
chanalian boast ;  just  a  few  idle  words  said  out 
of  the  lavishness  of  high  spirits ;  nothing  very 
desperate,  nothing  very  dark,  but  sufficient,  very 
often,  God  knows,  to  cause  a  man  to  be  given 
over  to  all  manner  of  devilries  and  despair,  by 
reason  of  the  crushing  punishment  it  calls  forth. 


ON  GUARD. 


151 


Take  from  a  man  all  hope  in  his  career,  or,  as 
is  frequently  done,  dismiss  him  from  it  with 
disgrace,  and  he  is  in  the  position  of  a  woman 
whose  fair  fame  has  been  dimmed.  All  is 
over  for  him  in  this  world,  however  it  may  be 
in  the  next.  We  should  deal  very  gently  with 
the  erring,  they  deal  so  hardly  with  themselves. 

Those,  and  those  alone  who  have  known  a 
man  who  is  under  a  cloud  in  the  flesh,  as  well 
as  in  books ;  who  have  seen  the  one  who  went 
from  his  home  a  star,  return  to  it  a  fallen  one ; 
who  have  marked  a  father  grow  stern  to  a  fa- 
vourite son,  because  that  sou  and  a  profession 
that  was  as  dear  to  him  as  a  son  had  parted 
ignominiously ;  who  have  witnessed  the  agony 
of  late  repentance  in  the  severely  punished 
man ;  the  shrinking  from  former  friends ;  the 
withdrawal  of  former  friends  from  him;  the 
gloomy  turning  away  from  those  who  show 
affection  for  him  still,  and  who  wound  him  by 
showing  it  pityingly ;  the  morose  doubts  as  to 
that  justice  and  mercy  which  have  not  been 
extended  to  himself,  existing  at  all ;  those  who 
have  sorrowed  for  the  blackness  that  is  his  sole 
portion  now,  for  whom  all  had  been  brightness 
formerly ;  those  and  those  alone  will  understand 
this  chapter  and  the  feelings  which  dictate  it. 

Stanley  Villars  had  not  been  wrecked  by 
rigour,  or  routine,  or  respectability.  On  the 
contrary,  his  ruin  had  been  wrought  by  his  own 
hand  entirely.  He  owed  his  destruction  to  no 
stingingly  sharp,  horribly  public  reprimand ;  to 
no  over  severity;  to  no  official  animus.  He 
had  "  gone  to  the  bad,"  as  Claude  Walsingham 
called  it,  simply  because  he  had  not  been  able 
to  brook  disappointment,  and  the  downfall  of  all 
those  mere  tender  hopes  which  made  up,  despite 
his  outward  sternness,  a  larger  portion  of  his 
than  most  men's  lives.  Love  was  to  him  more 
than  it  is  to  most  men ;  he  was  chary  of  it,  he 
gave  it  with  hesitation.  When  it  got  rudely 
treated,  and  thrown  back  to  him  as  a  thing  of 
no  worth,  there  seemed  to  be  nothing  left  to 
him.  So  he  suffered  himself  to  drift  into  un- 
seemly paths,  and  took  no  heed  as  to  what  he 
did  with  himself. 

He  did  all  things  that  he  was  compelled  to 
do,  or  was  led  into  doing,  without  the  smallest 
particle  of  heart,  the  smallest  atom  of  interest, 
the  smallest  semblance  of  feeling.  He  wrote 
carelessly,  not  with  the  carelessness  of  joyous- 
ness  and  thoughtlessness,  but  with  the  careless- 
ness of  black,  dogged  indifference ;  and  that  he 
did  so  was  marked,  and  marked  to  his  detri- 
ment. He  married  lovelessly,  and  quickly  came 
to  feel  that  his  wife's  lot  was  as  black  and  hard 
and  arid  as  his  own — a  sorrowful  conclusion  for 
a  sensitive  man  to  arrive  at.  He  ceased  to  take 
an  interest  in  all  that  he  had  hitherto  been 
interested  in ;  and  when  he  had  done  so,  and 
found  that  all  ceased  to  take  an  interest  in  him, 
aa  was  natural,  the  stultifying  sense  of  utter 
stagnation  came  down  and  utterly  crushed  him. 
Worst  of  all,  he  felt  himself  to  be  an  erring  man, 
and  also  felt  that  the  time  for  retracing  his  steps, 
for  redeeming  his  error,  was  gone  by.  There 
was  no  opportunity  for  amending,  for  death  was 
staring  him  in  the  face.  For  it  was  quite  true, 
that  statement  which  Claude  Walsingham  had 
declared  to  be  but  "  an  ingenious  fabrication  of 
that  girl's."  Stanley  Villars  had  broken  a 
blood-vessel,  and  there  was  now  upon  his  brow 


the  pallor  of  fast-approaching  dissolution.  He 
looked  such  a  haggard,  pallid  man,  that  the 
stranger  turnedjx)  look  upon  him  as  he  passed 
along  the  street,  and  the  casual  acquaintance 
passed  by  on  the  other  side,  because  life  is  too 
short  and  too  brisk  in  London  to  admit  of  any 
dallying  on  the  road. 

Two  or  three  men  whom  he  knew  well,  who 
had  been  employed  with  him  on  the  same  jour- 
nal, who  had  thought  rather  good  things  of  him 
when  he  came  among  them  first,  met  him  this 
day,  and  looked  upon  him  with  the  eyes  of  men 
whose  judgment  he  had  disappointed,  and  whose 
verdict  he  had  made  faulty.  They  told  him 
"distinctly,"  as  they  afterwards  said,  that  "if 
he  didn't  put  a  stop  to  this  sort  of  thing,  and  go 
away  somewhere  for  a  rest,  he'd  be  sorry  for 
it."  He  thanked  them  for  their  advice,  and 
said,  "he'd  think  about  it,"  as  he  did,  truth  to 
tell,  somewhat  bitterly. 

You  see  he  had  no  very  intimate  associates 
among  these  men.  The  majority,  though  run- 
ning a  career  of  work  equally  hard,  and  of  dissi- 
pation far  harder  than  his  own,  were  running  it 
unencumbered.  They  had  had  the  wit  not  to 
hamper  themselves  with  wives  without  money. 
If  they  lived  in  dingy  lodgings,  they  dined  at 
good  clubs,  and  it  was  at  their  clubs  that  other 
men  saw  them.  Moreover,  it  was  very  few  of 
them  who  did  live  in  dingy  lodgings,  and  these 
only  the  youngest  and  most  unassuming  of  the 
band.  The  older  men  had  neat  little  sets  of 
chambers,  and  some  of  them  possessed  a  fine 
taste  in  books  and  pictures,  and  engraved  glass, 
which  they  gratified.  The  most  of  them,  too, 
dressed  well,  and  in  consequence  fought  shy 
of  a  man  whose  new  clothes  were  worse  than 
his  old  threadbare  ones,  in  that  they  were  so^ 
execrably  cut. 

Had  he  been  "  alone  in  his  hole,"  as  they  said, 
there  were  many  who  would  have  sought  him 
out  and  striven  to  urge  him  forward,  with  hand 
and  voice,  ay,  and  pen  too.  But  it  was  not 
congenial  to  them  to  go  and  sit  in  a  dull  room, 
with  a  downcast  man  and  a  little  girl  who  had 
nothing  in  common  with  them — who  was  "  left 
behind  "  invariably,  when  they  did  try  to  talk 
to  her.  Bad  as  such  a  position  was,  a  lady 
would  have  been  better  placed  in  it ;  that  is  to 
say,  she  would  have  made  it  better  to  his 
friends,  and  through  them  to  her  husband.  It 
was  not  the  fault  of  his  fellow-labourers  that 
he  slipped  away  from  them  entirely,  save  just 
when  they  chanced  to  meet  him  at  the  office. 
The  man  whose  home  will  not  stand  inspection 
must  do  this  eventually,  no  matter  how  warm 
the  original  feeling  towards  him.  He  was  care- 
worn, downcast,  and  badly  dressed !  With  the 
best  intentions  in  the  world,  other  men  could 
not  invite  him  to  make  these  facts  more  public 
still,  by  "joining  them  anywhere." 

Bligh,  the  man  who  had  taken  his  work  for 
him,  held  on  to  him  with  the  resolute  staunch- 
ness of  youth  and  strength;  also  with  the 
tenacity  which  comes  of  having  a  certain  amount 
of  spare  time  in  which  to  display  such  tenacious- 
ness.  Bligh  went  to  him  daily,  writing  what 
he  couldn't  write,  and  revising  what  he  wrote, 
and  bidding  him  cheer  up,  with  an  earnest 
hopefulness  of  better  things  being  in  store  for 
Stanley,  which  proved  that  he  was  looking  upon 
the  spectacle  of  a  boat  going  down  for  the  first 


152 


ON  GUARD. 


time.  Went  to  him  daily,  feeling  the  whole 
time  that  Stanley's  wife  was  not  quite  sure  of 
what  her  manner  should  have  been  to  him,  she 
being  palpably  in  doubt  as  to  whether  he  was 
really  a  friend  or  only  a  portion  of  the  printing 
machine  with  which  Stanley  had  to  do,  in  a  way 
that  was  likewise  not  clear  to  her. 

This  day,  however,  on  which  he  had  gone 
out,  leaving  Marian  crying  in  the  passage,  he 
had  not  met  with  Bligh.  He  had  only  fallen 
in  with. those  men  who  tendered  him  advice 
which  was  admirable,  but  difficult  to  act  upon 
under  existing  circumstances ;  it  was  not  upon 
the  cards  that  he  should  "  cut  work  for  a  time 
and  go  to  the  sea-side,"  which  was  what  his 
advisers  recommended,  in  the  liberal  manner 
in  which  people  are  wont  to  recommend  plea- 
sant extravagances  to  their  impoverished 
friends. 

He  had  come  to  the  stage  of  pitying  himself 
profoundly  before  this  juncture,  of  pitying  him- 
self almost  as  if  he  were  another  man ;  he  could 
stand  aside,  as  it  were,  in  his  cooler  moments, 
and  watch  the  creature  he  had  become,  and  feel 
sure  of  what  the  end  would  be,  almost  as 
clearly  as  the  most  circumspect  among  his  ac- 
quaintances could  have  done.  He  knew  that 
his  bark  was  stove  in  and  rapidly  filling;  and 
he  felt  a  pity  for  that  it  was  so.  But  he  never 
thought  of  attempting  to  bale  out  the  water 
that  was  swamping  him.  He  was  wrecked,  and 
it  seemed  to  him  too  late  to  avoid  going  down. 

I  do  not  think,  after  all,  that  the  sight  of 
Bella  the  day  before,  in  all  the  bravery  of  her 
beauty,  and  with  her  beauty  set  off  by  all  those 
little  toilet  elegancies  which  money  alone  can 
deck  a  woman  in,  no  matter  how  good  her  taste 
may  be, — I  do  not  think  that  the  sight  of  Bella 
had  been  good  for  him.  It  was  like  the  spirit 
of  the  past  he  had  known,  coming  to  mock  him 
in  his  present  dark  poverty.  There  was  about 
her  such  refinement,  brightness,  beauty,  and 
wealth;  and  all  these  things  were  gone  from 
his  life. 

The  meagreness  of  the  room,  the  meanness 
of  his  own  avid  his  wife's  habiliments,  the 
miserable  lack  of  all  that  was  graceful  and  re- 
fined in  their  surroundings,  the  poverty  and 
barrenness,  the  arid  nature  of  the  soil  on  which 
he  was  stranded  for  ever,  had  never  struck  him 
so  vividly  before.  He  thought  bitterly  of  the 
contrast  between  now  and  then — very,  very 
bitterly  of  it ! 

He  had  drifted  away  into  this  dismal  swamp, 
this  slough  of  despond,  and  no  man  had  put 
out  a  hand  to  hold  him  back.  They  had,  one 
and  all,  let  him  drift.  Had  he  been  wealthy, 
or  at  any  rate  independent,  his  gloomy  despair 
would  have  rendered  him  interesting  perhaps, 
and  society  might  have  set  itself  the  pleasing 
task  of  comforting  him— taking  him  to  its 
bosom  as  it  has  taken  other  "stricken  deer," 
however  mad,  bad,  and  dangerous  to  know, 
they  have  been.  But  he  was  not  wealthy,  or 
even  independent,  and  gloomy  despair  in  a  poor 
man  is  a  bore  in  a  drawing-room.  He  had  no 
club  of  his  own,  and  he  was  not  convivial 
enough  to  be  carried  away  perforce  by  other 
men  to  expensive  little  club  dinners  which  he 
could  never  return.  He  was  a  literary  man, 
out  at  elbows,  in  a  barefaced,  pinched,  despica- 
ble way,  and,  as  such,  was  no  credit  to  the  fra- 


ternity. Consequently,  without  meaning  it 
exactly — wishing  him  well,  but  being  unable  to 
serve  him— the  fraternity  felt  that  the  whirl  of 
London  life  was  separating  him  from  them,  car- 
rying him  out  of  their  orbit,  and  didn't  precisely 
see  why,  and  how,  and  where ! 

It  was  no  one's  fault,  but  he  was  a  very 
friendless  man.  The  knowledge  that  he  had  a 
poor,  patient  little  wife  at  home,  had  kept  him 
at  first  from  accepting  invitations  to  enter  into 
that  masculine  society  which  all  men  need,  and 
which  would  have  braced  him  up.  This  know- 
ledge kept  him  from  accepting  their  invitations 
at  first;  and  by-and-by  the  same  knowledge 
kept  the  men  from  inviting  him.  It  was  no 
one's  fault,  but  he  was  a  very  friendless  man. 
The  full  knowledge  that  he  was  so,  the  full 
horror  of  being  so,  had  seized  upon  him  after 
Bella  had  left  that  day.  He  had  endeavoured 
to  dispel  it  by  that  course  of  drinking  and  writ- 
ing and  smoking  which  Marian  had  recounted 
to  Mrs  Claude  "Walsingham.  He  had  failed  in 
his  endeavour,  and  broken  a  blood-vessel  into 
the  bargain,  and  then  he  had  risen  up,  swearing 
that  he  "would  not  lie  there  and  die  like  a  dog !  " 

The  yearning  to  see  his  family  again — his 
brother  and  sisters,  especially  Florence — came 
upon  him  as  he  went  along  the  streets  alone. 
It  was  hard,  very  hard,  that  the  gulf  which  he 
had  created  between  them  and  himself,  in  his 
first  rash  wrath,  should  be  between  them  till 
the  end.  The  end !  yes,  it  was  coming.  Men 
in  his  state  did  not  live  long,  he  knew,  when 
the  strain  that  reduced  them  to  such  a  state 
was  kept  up.  He  was  told  off  for  death  surely 
enough.  It  was  hard,  very  hard,  to  think  that 
those  who  had  been  little  children  with  him  but 
the  other  day  as  it  seemed,  he  was  still  so 
young,  should  go  on  their  way  rejoicing,  indif- 
ferent to  or  unconscious  of  the  fiat  that  had 
gone  forth. 

They  were  his  brother  and  his  sister  still. 
Such  a  little  thing  would  bring  them  together 
again  for  the  short  time  that  was  left  to  him — 
such  a  little  thing  would  do  it,  if  only  the  op- 
portunity were  given.  The  days  were  not  so 
very  long  past  in  which  Gerald  had  looked  up 
to  him,  and  his  sisters  had  relied  upon  him  be- 
yond all  others,  and  even  Carrie  herself  had 
given  in  to  his  decree. 

Those  days  were  not  so  long  past  in  reality, 
but  they  were  a  long  way  off  in  seeming,  as  he 
turned  round  the  corner  of  the  square  and  came 
in  sight  of  Gerald's  house.  He  had  wandered 
on  and  on,  never  intending  to  go  so  far,  never 
owning  to  himself  that  it  was  towards  Gerald's 
house  that  his  steps  were  tending.  When  he 
found  himself  close  upon  it  he  started,  and 
stopped!  and  his  heart  began  to  thump  omi- 
nously, and  the  dew  to  gather  on  his  brow. 
They  were  "  so  near,  and  yet  so  far."  It  would 
have  been  such  a  little  thing  to  have  gone  for- 
ward and  lifted  the  knocker  that  he  had  lifted  a 
thousand  times  before,  in  the  days  when  he  was 
a  son  of  that  house,  and  as  free  to  p«ss  its  thres- 
hold as  Gerald  himself.  It  would  have  been 
such  a  little  thing !  But  he  did  not  do  it.  He 
thought  of  the  stare  the  man  who  opened  the 
door  would  give ;  he  thought  of  the  signs  of 
decay  that  were  about  him ;  he  thought  of  how 
they  all— even  Florence — had  let  him  go;  and 
as  he  thought  of  these  things,  he  told  himself 


OX  GUARD. 


153 


that  the  time  "  was  gone  by."  And  yet  he  was 
dying !  and  the  desire  in  his  heart  to  see  them 
once  more  was  such  a  big  one ! 

While  he  was  standing  there,  too  weak  to  go 
on,  too  weak  to  go  back,  too  weak  to  conquer 
his  desire  or  give  way  to  it,  a  carriage  drew  up 
at  the  door  of  the  house  at  which  he  stood  gaz- 
ing, and  with  a  dreamy  wonder  he  recognised 
in  the  occupants  of  it  Bella  Vane  and  the  baby- 
faced  beauty.  Then  he  remembered  that  Bella 
Vane  was  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham,  and  that 
the  baby-faced  beauty  was  his  wife.  And  then 
he  saw  it  all !  His  wife  had  been  brought  there 
to  seek  for  him,  or  to  sue  for  him  1  He  leant 
against  the  corner  shuddering.  It  was  too  late  to 
interfere.  That  which  he  had  shrunk  from  doing 
was  being  done  for  him,  and  he  was  conscious  of 
a  sick  wild  hope  that  it  might  end  well — that  his 
wife  would  win  admission  for  herself  and  re-ad- 
mission for  him,  and  that  they  would  see  and 
forgive  and  love  him  at  the  last.  You  see  his 
pride  was  pretty  well  broken,  poor  fellow !  He 
was,  in  truth,  humbled  and  softened  in  a  way 
that  it  is  very  sad  to  see. 

It  has  already  been  told  how  that  visit  ended. 
By  and-by  he  saw  Bella  come  out  again  and 
enter  her  carriage ;  and  as  he  saw  the  expres- 
sion of  the  women's  faces  as  they  drove  past 
him  (for  he  never  thought  of  attempting  to  hide 
himself),  he  saw  that  it  was  all  over — that  his 
sick,  wild  hope  had  been  born  to  perish.  Then 
he  turned  himself  away  resolutely,  thinking,  as 
we  are  apt  to  think  when  we  only  see  one  side 
of  the  shield,  that  "  his  own"  had  been  more 
bitter  and  harder  to  him  than  was  the  case  in 
reality.  As  he  so  thought,  he  swore  a  solemn 
oath  never  to  hold  communion  with  one  of  them 
again.  They  "  had  cast  him  off  utterly,  evident- 
ly ;  repudiated  his  wife,  perhaps ;  made  him  a 
by-word,  a  thing  of  scorn,  in  the  eyes  and 
mouths  of  their  blackguard  flunkies!  Come 
what  would  now,  he  would  never  nurse  a  soft 
thought  of  one  of  them  again."  Those  of  whom 
he  thought  and  muttered  had  been  little  child- 
ren with  him,  and  had  at  the  same  mother's 
knees  lisped  their  little  prayers ! 

There  can  be  no  worse  hell  than  was  in  this 
man's  heart  as  he  walked  away.  Whatever  his 
faults  had  been,  whatever  his  sin  had  been,  he 
was  being  punished  for  it  in  the  flesh  in  a  way 
that  must  have  purified  his  spirit ;  he  was  hav- 
ing it  here  in  a  way  that  entitled  him  to  the 
brightest  hereafter.  How  horrible  it  is,  that  the 
actions  of  others,  erring,  weak,  and  faulty  as 
himself,  can  make  a  human  being  so  hopelessly 
wretqjjed. 

lie  did  not  go  straight  home.  Miserable  as 
he  was  himself,  he  shrank  from  seeing  the 
misery  and  disappointment  that  he  fancied 
would  be  upon  the  pretty  face  of  the  poor  little 
log  he  had  tied  to  him.  She  was  not  very 
deep,  still  he  did  not  fathom  her.  He  knew  no 
more  of  what  she  was  capable  when  put  to  the 
test,  than  a  man  can  know  of  a  woman  he  does 
not  love.  He  went  to  a  house  in  the  Strand,  and 
smoked  and  drank  brandy  till  the  pain  within 
him  was  dulled  a  trifle.  Then,  as  the  shadows 
grew  long,  and  the  house  began  to  fill  with 
men,  the  majority  of  whom  seemed  unpleasantly 
happy  and  well-pleased  with  life,  he  got  himself 
away  <5ut  into  the  street  once  more,  where  he 
was  seen  by  Claude,  who  shrank  out  of  his  way 


quickly,  as  a  thing  who  staggered  in  the  day- 
light, and  was  otherwise  disreputable. 

Stanley  had  marked  little  this  day  save  that 
door  which  was  barred  to  him,  and  the  occu- 
pant of  the  carriage  that  had  waited  at  it ;  but 
he  marked  his  old  friend  now,  and  his  old 
friend's  avoidance  of  him.  He  had  borne  a 
good  deal,  but  this  was  the  last  drop  in  the 
cup.  He  turned  away  down  one  of  those  little 
streets  that  lead  to  the  river. 


CHAPTER  XLVIL 

FOUND   OUT. 

BEFORE  Mrs.  Markham  went  down  to  dinner 
on  the  day  of  her  arrival  at  her  brother's  house, 
she  made  a  progress  into  Mrs.  Claude's  dressing- 
room,  expecting  to  find  her  sister-in-law  there. 
But  her  sister-in-law  was  not  there ;  accordingly 
Mrs.  Markham  looked  round  the  room  in  order 
to  see  what  additions  had  been  made  to  its 
decorations  since  she  last  saw  it. 

She  found  out  one  or  two  new  ornaments, 
and  disapproved  of  them,  as  beccime  a  woman 
who  had  no  taste  for  such  things  herself,  and 
no  indulgence  for  those  who  had,  and  gratified 
it.  "Absurdly  he  indulges  her,  to  be  sure," 
she  thought  severely,  as  though  every  one  of 
the  frivolities  she  censured  had  been  wrung 
from  the  sweat  of  Claude's  brow.  Then  she 
saw  something  else — a  letter  lying  in  the  cor- 
ner— and  pounced  upon  it  in  all  honour,  not 
intending  for  an  instant  to  read  it,  but  meaning 
to  deliver  it  up  to  Bella  with  a  reprimand  for 
being  "so  careless." 

She  did  not  intend  for  an  instant  to  read  it ; 
but  as  soon  as  she  got  it  into  her  hand  she  saw 
that  it  was  that  letter  which  Claude  had  found 
awaiting  him  on  his  return — that  special  letter 
which  he  had  given  her  to  read.  "  I  see  how 
it  is,"  she  thought;  "she's  explained  every- 
thing, and  there's  been  a  reconciliation.  Thank 
God  I" 

She  meant  this  thoroughly.  Hard  and  stern 
as  she  was,  she  was  also  just,  and  her  soul  re- 
coiled from  the  means  that  had  been  used  to 
bring  Bella  to  justice.  She  was  very  glad  that 
those  means  had  failed — very  glad  indeed — 
though  she  was  still  ready  and  willing  to 
swoop  down  upon  any  of  her  sister-in-law's 
shortcomings  in  fair  fight. 

She  put  the  letter  away  in  her  pocket,  mean- 
ing to  return  it  to  Bella  with  a  reprimand,  as  I 
said  before,  on  the  first  fitting  opportunity. 
Then  she  walked  grimly  down-stairs,  revolving 
many  things  in  her  mind;  amongst  others, 
whether  "  Jay  "  or  "  Marshall  and  Snellgrove  " 
should  execute  the  large  order  she  had  to  give 
on  the  morrow. 

Mrs.  Markham  was,  as  I  have  said,  a  very 
just  woman.  When  she  came  down  and  found 
that  all  was  fair  and  smooth  between  the  hus- 
band and  wife,  she  felt  that  Bella  must  have 
explained  very  satisfactorily  all  that  had  not 
looked  well,  and  that  therefore  it  behoved  her, 
Claude's  sister,  to  say  something  apologetic 
about  her  manner  previously.  She  felt  that 
it  would  only  be  just  to  Bella  to  say  this,  and 


154 


ON  GUARD. 


she  would  be  just  though  she  could  not  be 
gracious. 

Now  Mrs.  Markham's  justice  was  a  harder 
thing  to  bear  than  most  women's  injustice 
would  have  been.  It  was  so  very  hard,  that 
even  when  it  commended,  you  thought  more 
of  how  it  would  be  down  upon  you  did  it  ever 
catch  you  tripping,  than  of  its  present  com- 
mendation. There  was  a  certain  wintry  bright- 
ness in  her  manner  to  Bella  during  dinner 
which  was  not  pleasant,  but  which  said  plainly 
that  Bella  was  not  so  bad  as  she  (Mrs.  Mark- 
ham)  had  imagined,  and  that  she  was  glad 
of  it. 

Mrs.  Markham  had  resolved  upon  not  saying 
her  say,  upon  not  speaking  her  words  of  justice,' 
until  they  should  all  have  re-assembled  in  the 
drawing-room  after  dinner.  Her  manner,  how- 
ever, made  manifest  to  Bella  that  some  such 
recantation  of  error  was  looming,  and  Bella 
forthwith  tried  to  strengthen  herself  for  the 
reception  of  one  of  the  most  unpleasant  things 
in  the  world — a  grim  apology. 

"I  wish  she'd  drop  it,  but  I  see  she  won't," 
Bella  thought,  as  she  was  walking  up-stairs 
behind  her  sister-in-law  after  dinner.  "I  wish 
I'd  made  Claude  come  up  with  us ;  this  eternal 
talkee  talkee  is  tedious  ! "  she  mentally  added, 
as  she  thought  of  what  Mrs.  Markham  would 
say,  and  what  she  would  have  to  say  in  return, 
and  what  Mrs.  Markham  would  then  reply, 
occurred  to  her. 

She  was  spared  the  infliction  yet  awhile.  "  I 
shall  go  to  my  own  room  till  Claude  comes  up, 
and  you  have  tea,  Bella,"  Mrs.  Markham  said, 
when  they  reached  the  top  of  the  stairs.  "I'm 
by  no  means  sure  that  that  list  is  complete,  and 
as  we've  no  time  to  lose,  I'll  just  look  over  it 
again." 

"Very  well,"  Bella  replied;  "as  you  like, 
Ellen.  I  will  help  you  to-morrow,  of  course  ; 
we  shall  only  have  the  morning,  remember. 
Claude  means  to  take  us  off  by  the  3.40  train." 
"  Quite  right  too ;  we  ought  to  get  back  to 
my  poor  mother  as  speedily  as  possible,"  Mrs. 
Markham  replied,  as  grimly  as  if  Bella  were 
responsible  for  the  desolation  that  had  come 
upon  Mrs.  Walsingham.  With  that  they  sepa- 
rated, Mrs.  Markham  going  on  to  her  own 
room,  and  Bella  and  Grace  Harper  into  the 
drawing-room. 

Bella  had  been  civil,  scrupulously  civil,  to 
Miss  Harper ;  but  she  had  felt  very  savage  with 
the  fair  Grace  since  that  explanation  with 
Claude.  "  What  right  has  she — what  right  has 
any  woman — to  speak  about  me,  to  censure 
me,  by  word  or  implication  to  my  husband?" 
Bella  thought.  "  I  can  forgive  Claude,  dear 
Claude,  for  having  listened ;  but  I'll  never  for- 
give her  for  having  spoken." 

Accordingly,  now  when  they  found  them- 
selves alone,  they  found  themselves  uncomfort- 
ably placed,  for  Bella  was  not  the  sort  of 
woman  to  conceive  a  deep  antipathy,  and 
conceal  it.  While  Miss  Harper  was  her  guest, 
she  would  treat  her  as  such;  but  there  was 
that  in  her  manner  which  assured  Grace  that 
she  would  never  be  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham's 
guest  again. 

Miss  Harper  dried  her  eyes  as  soon  as  she 
found  herself  alone  with  Mrs.  Claude.  She 
had  kept  them  damp  during  the  whole  day, 


and  Mrs.  Markham  had  been  considerably 
touched  thereby.  The  latter  was  not  one  of 
the  weeping  order  of  womankind  herself,  but 
the  two  tears  which  Grace  had  established  as 
soon  as  she  heard  the  tidings  of  Mr.  Walsing- 
ham's death,  had  been  accepted  rather  above 
their  due  worth  as  a  just  and  proper  tribute, 
by  Mr.  Walsingham's  daughter.  Miss  Graco 
perceived  this,  and  as  her  grief  was  not  a  dis- 
figuring thing,  she  kept  up  the  soft  semblance, 
and  gratified  Mrs.  Markham. 

But  now  that  she  was  alone  with  Bella,  the 
tears  were  abolished  at  once.  She  felt  that 
Bella  saw  through  her.  For  this  she  cared 
little  as  matters  were  going;  but  she  would 
not  give  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  the  satisfac- 
tion of  seeing  a  transparent  deception  practised 
without  an  end  or  aim.  So  she  dried  her  eyes, 
and  subsided  (it  being  after  dinner,  and  she 
feeling  a  little  sleepy)  into  tearless  composure 
on  a  couch. 

"  She  shall  not  infest '  the  Court '  when  I'm 
the  mistress  of  it,"  Bella  thought,  as  she 
glanced  towards  her  calm  guest ;  "if  my  being 
cool  to  her  huffs  the  Markham  I  can't  help  it. 
She  must  be  huifed,  for  I  won't  have  that  girl 
about  my  house  any  more." 

The  evening  was  warm,  quiet,  conducive  to 
thought,  and  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  had 
much  to  think  about,  even  though  she  would 
not  permit  her  mind  to  dwell  upon  the  Stanley 
Villarses.  The  whole  plan  of  her  life  would 
be  altered  by  Mr.  Walsingham's  death.  Claude 
would,  of  course,  have  to  go  down  and  take 
up  his  part  of  big  man  in  the  county.  Hence- 
forth all  her  interests  would  centre  in  that 
neighbourhood  which  had  seemed  so  dull  to 
her  when  she  was  in  it  as  a  guest.  She  had  no 
fears,  however,  of  its  seeming  dull  to  her  in 
future ;  the  pleasure  of  possession  was  upon 
her  already.  She  would  be  the  queen  of  that 
little  world;  she  would  no  longer  be  the 
jealously  watched  wife  of  the  heir-apparent 
merely. 

She  would  not  permit  her  mind  to  dwell 
upon  the  Stanley  Yillarses  any  more,  and  this 
not  out  of  heartless  forgetfulness,  but  because 
she  had  promised  her  husband  not  to  go  near 
them  again,  and  she  felt  that  it  was  upon  the 
cards  that  she  might  break  her  promise  did  she 
think  about  them.  The  hope  that  she  might 
be  permitted  to  alleviate,  in  a  measure,  in  the 
present,  the  woe  of  which  she  had  been  the 
cause  in  the  past,  was  dead.  The  only  thing 
left  to  her  was  to  bury  it,  and  all  appertaining 
to  it,  as  speedily  as  possible, — to  bury  tt  en- 
tirely out  of  sight,  and  so  fulfil,  to  the  uwiost, 
the  compact  she  had  made  with  her  husband. 

Love  had  thoroughly  tamed  her.  She  did 
not  rebel,  even  in  her  innermost  heart,  against 
this  decree  of  Claude's,  to  cease  from  all  com- 
munion with  the  man  they  had  both  aided  in 
blighting.  Claude  willed  it,  and  that  was 
enough  for  her.  Like  Tennyson's  May  Queen, 
she  "had  been  wild  and  wayward;  but  she 
was  not  wayward  now." 

It  was  late  in  the  evening  before  Claude  and 
his  sister  came  in  to  tea.  When  they  did  come, 
they  came  together — a  fact  that  requires  a  brief 
explanation. 

Mrs.  Markham  had  gone  back  to  her  bedroom, 
to  look  over  the  list  of  articles  required  for  the 


Otf  GUAED. 


155 


mourning,  in  which  the  whole  establishment 
down  at  the  Court  had  to  be  placed.  After 
doing  this,  and  jotting  a  few  after-thoughts,  in 
the  way  of  handkerchiefs  with  broad  hems,  &c., 
she  went  over  to  the  couch  Grace  had  occupied 
during  the  greater  portion  of  the  day,  and  pen- 
sively placed  herself  upon  it. 

Then  she,  too,  fell  to  thinking  about  the  same 
subject  that  Bella  was  dwelling  upon  below — 
viz.,  the  difference  that  her  father's  death  would 
make  in  life  at  the  Court.  Mrs.  Markham  did 
not  like  Bella,  therefore  she  adjudged  her  capa- 
ble of  actions  that  were  iniquitous  in  her  eyes. 
"I  shouldn't  wonder  if  she  gets  Claude  to  turn 
his  mother  out,  and,  after  all,  won't  care  to  live 
there  much  herself,"  she  thought,  which,  con- 
sidering that  she  had  warmly  protested  against 
the  aged  Mrs.  Markham  dwelling  in  the  same 
tent  with  herself  on  the  occasion  of  her  own 
nuptials,  was  a  little  inconsistent.  But  then, 
people  whose  important  actions  are  always 
marked  by  a  perfect  propriety,  may  be  granted 
the  liberty  of  being  inconsistent  about  such  tri- 
fling matters  as  their  fellow-creatures,  and  the 
motives  that  rule  the  same. 

"I  wish  they  would  have  tea  at  a  decent 
hour  in  this  house,"  Mrs.  Markham  said  to  her- 
self, petulantly,  after  about  an  hour  had  elapsed, 
and  no  summons  had  come  to  her  from  the 
region  where  the  tea  was  to  be  consumed. 
"  What  must  Grace  Harper  think  of  the  manage- 
ment here?  Everything  so  shockingly  irregu- 
lar!" 

She  turned  round  impatiently  as  she  thought 
this.  It  had  been  very  unpleasant  to  her  that 
Grace  Harper,  than  whom  she  firmly  believed 
there  was  not  a  better  regulated  young  woman 
in  civilization — it  had  been  very  unpleasant  to 
her  that  Grace  Harper  should  have  been  cogni- 
sant of  the  fact  of  misunderstandings  having 
arisen  between  Claude  and  his  wife.  The  mis- 
chief was  done,  however,  and  nothing  was  left 
but  to  pray  that  Bella,  the  erring,  might  deport 
herself  for  the  future  with  becoming  solemnity, 
and  so  erase  from  Miss  Harper's  mind  the  im- 
pression former  levity  had  made  on  it. 

As  the  thought  of  the  various  irregularities 
of  the  house  struck  her,  she  turned  round  impa- 
tiently, and  her  eye  lighted  on  an  envelope  that 
had  fallen  down  between  the  cushion  and  the 
head  of  the  couch.  In  a  moment,  her  hand  was 
upon  it.  It  was  addressed  to  Miss  Harper,  and 
it  contained  no  letter,  therefore  she  turned  it 
round  idly. 

Turned  it  round  idly,  with  the  half  design  of 
looking  at  the  monogram  or  seal,  and  then 
started  up  erect,  with  an  exclamation  of  "  Good 
heavens  V'  and  commenced  rapidly  searching  in 
her  own  pocket  for  the  letter  she  had  found  in 
Bella's  dressing-room,  for  the  inside  of  the  en- 
velope, that  evidently  belonged  to  Miss  Harper, 
was  covered  with  duplicate  words  in  duplicate 
handwriting  to  those  which  the  anonymous 
epistle  had  contained. 

She  saw  it  all  in  an  instant— saw  the  whole 
of  the  perfidy  and  the  treachery  that  had  been 
planned  and  partly  carried  out.  She  did  not 
like  her  brother's  wife,  and  she  knew  that  her 
brother's  wife  did  not  like  her.  But  for  all  that, 
the  perfidy  was  very  painful,  and  the  treachery 
very  terrible  to  her,  of  which  it  had  been  in- 
tended that  Bella  should  be  the  victim. 


She  kept  the  two— the  envelope  that  had 
been  practised  upon,  and  the  letter,  the  result 
of  that  diabolical  practice — in  her  hands  for 
some  few  minutes,  comparing  them,  and  decid- 
ing "what  she  ought  to  do  next."  She  was  a 
very  just  woman,  and  she  knew  that  obnoxious 
as  anything  like  an  open  detection,  and  the 
bringing  to  justice  of  the  offender,  would  be, 
that  it  behoved  her  to  put  her  brother  on  guard 
against  the  real  enemy,  and  to  say  to  her  brother's 
wife,  ""We  have  all  wronged  you." 

But  it  would  be  hard,  very  hard  to  do  this. 
They — her  mother  and  herself— had  a  little  to 
answer  for  in  the  matter,  for  they  had  both  not 
only  taught  Grace  in  the  old  days  to  regard 
Claude  as  specially  her  own,  but  they  had  also 
suffered  her  to  feel  when  Claude  married  that 
they  regarded  Bella  as  her  special  foe.  They 
had  been  to  blame  in  the  matter;  but  then, 
"Who  could  have  supposed  her  such  a  ser- 
pent?" Mrs.  Markham  said  to  herself,  angrily. 

I  think  Mrs.  Markham  hated  her  smooth-sur- 
faced, well-ordered  young  friend  in  that  hour  of 
detection,  debate,  and  uncertainty.  "When 
she  finds  I  know  it,  she  ought  to  be  ashamed  to 
look  one  of  the  family  in  the  face  again,"  she 
thought.  "  How  ever  she'll  dare  to  show  her- 
self in  society,  or  take  the  sacrament,  I  can't 
think  1  "  and  Mrs.  Markham  shuddered^ 

But  though  she  shuddered,  and  f^M;  that 
much  shame  would  be  upon  her  old  friend  and 
favourite,  did  she  not  hold  her  peace,  Mrs. 
Markham  never  dreamt  of  holding  it.  She  was 
a  just  woman,  essentially  a  just  woman,  and 
though  she  would  have  no  sensation  scene,  no 
idle  conversation  on  the  subject,  there  was 
something  to  be  done,  and  something  to  be  said, 
in  justice  to  Claude's  wife. 

She  went  out  of  her  room,  and  down  the 
stairs,  with  the  envelope  and  letter  gathered 
together  closely  in  one  hand,  looking  as  hard, 
firm,  and  cold  as  usual.  But  she  was  not  hard 
and  cold  now,  however  firm  she  might  be.  She 
was  thinking  rather  softly  of  the  girl  whom  she 
didn't  like,  and  who  might  have  been  wrecked 
by  the  girl  she  had  liked  till  now. 

She  found  her  brother  looking  at  the  evening 
papers,  and  smoking  a  cigar.  It  had  pleased 
him  to  remain  longer  by  himself  than  was  usual 
with  him  this  night.  He,  too,  had  had  much 
to  think  about.  Despite  of  all  those  hard 
things  he  had  said  about  Stanley  Villars,  the 
sight  of  his  old  friend  staggering  in  the  Strand 
had  been  a  cruel  one  to  him. 

Mrs.  Markham  came  in  with  no  idle  apologies 
for  interrupting  him.  She  had  something  to 
say ;  she  had  no  scruples  about  the  manner  of 
saying  it. 

"I  think  you  know  that  I  don't  like  your 
wife,  Claude,"  she  began;  to  which  Claude  re- 
plied— 

"  I  think  you  might  select  some  one  to  impart 
that  fact  to  who'd  care  a  damn  for  it — /  dou't!' 

"Hush !  "  she  said,  as  though  he  had  been  a 
small  boy  still.  "I  was  going  to  say  that 
though  I  don't  like  her,  I  owe  her  some  repa- 
ration— and  so  do  you,  for  she  has  been  very 
badly  treated  ?  " 

He  looked  up  from  his  paper,  and  asked, 
quickly,  "  By  whom  ?  " 

"By  all  of  us  I  Just  look  here!"  and  then 
she  unfolded  the  letter  and  the  envelope,  and 


156 


ON  GUARD. 


handed  them  to  Claude,  who  said  "  Pooh  I  "  and 
could  make  nothing  fresh  of  the  combination. 

"  But,  Claude,"  she  expostulated,  "  you 
must ! " 

"  Oh,  botheration !  What's  the  good  of  it  ? 
— that's  all  done  with  now !  Bella  has  told  me 
the  truth,  and  explained  away  the  malice,  and 
there's  nothing  more  to  be  said." 

"  But  there  is  much  more  to  be  said,  Claude 
— the  malice  comes  from  a  quarter  where  we 
least  expect  to  find  it." 

"  Answer  for  yourself!  I  expect  to  find 
malice  in  every  quarter !  " 

Mrs.  Markham  moved  her  shoulders,  and 
passed  over  the  cynical  remark.  She  was  as 
cynical  as  her  brother  in  her  heart,  but  she  put 
her  cynicism  on  another  score — as  is  the  habit 
of  professing  Christians ! 

"  There  is  this  much  more  to  be  said  about 
this,  Claude — I  am  very  much  afraid  that  your 
wife  has  been  very  much  wronged !  " 

"Why  to  God  do  you  harp  on  that?"  he 
asked.  "She  told  me  how  it  came  about,  and 
I'm  quite  satisfied.  What  more  do  you  want  ?" 

"  I  want  to  tell  you  that  I'm  very  sorry  for 
my  share  in  the  business." 

"  Your  share  in  the  business  has  been  small 
enough,  as  far  as  I  can  see,"  Claude  replied. 
He  felt  some  of  the  younger  brother  sensations 
come^^er  him  as  Mrs.  Markham  denounced 
herselP 

"  My  share  in  the  business  has  been,  that  I 
have  made  the  writer  of  that  letter  my  friend," 
she  said — "  that  I've  believed  in  her,  and— 
come,  I  will  out  with  it  all  now — allowed  her  to 
see  that  I  thought  less  of  Bella  than  I  had  any 
right  to  do.  Bella  has  told  you  the  truth,  and 
you  are  satisfied;  but  that  doesn't  do  away 
with  the  obligation  that  is  on  me  to  tell  you 
that  I  have  found  out  that  it's  Grace  Harper 
who  put  the  truth  before  you  first  in  an  unplea- 
sant way — and — and — I'm  disgusted  with  her!" 

"  Grace  Harper !— the  devil  it  is !  "  he  said  ; 
and  then  he  began  to  look  at  the  letter  and  en- 
velope. "What  reason  could  she  have  for  try- 
ing on  that  little  game  ?  "  he  asked,  after  a 
minute  or  two ;  and  then  he  looked  curiously 
at  his  sister,  and  his  sister  looked  curiously  at 
him. 

"Never  mind  her  motive — the  way  she  has 
acted  is  plain  enough.  Claude,  I'm  sorry  and 
ashamed  that  I  should  ever  have  thought  her 
fit  to  hold  a  candle  to  Bella — she  is  not!" 

"  I  always  knew  that,"  he  replied,  briefly. 

"  Whatever  Bella's  faults  may  be,"  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  went  on — for  even  now  she  could  not  for- 
get that  Bella  had  faults— "whatever  Bella's 
faults  may  be,  she's  neither  cowardly,  mean, 
nor  sly.  She  doesn't  like  me,  but  I  will  say 
that  for  her." 

"She  likes  you  as  well  as  you  like  her," 
Claude  replied.  "As  for  Miss  Grace,  and  her 
small  attempts  to  part  us,  you  may  as  well  give 
her  to  understand  that  my  wife  is  dearer  to  me 
than  ever.  The  devil  might  whisper  to  me  now 
about  her,  and  I  should  turn  a  deaf  ear!" 

He  said  this  very  warmly.  He  knew  how 
the  hearing  of  it  would  sting  Grace  Harper,  and 
he  desired  nothing  so  much  as  that  Grace  Har- 
per should  be  stung. 

Mrs.  Markham  bowed  her  head.  "After 
what  I  have  told  you,  Claude,  it  will  be  better 


that  Grace  should  go  down  with  me  alone,  I 
think.  Bella  and  you  can  follow — say  the  day 
after  to-morrow.  I  shall  say  nothing  till  we  get 
back  to  the  Court,  but  I  don't  suppose  your 
wife  will  care  to  keep  Miss  Harper's  name  on 
her  visiting  list." 

"I  suppose  not."  he  replied — "that  is,  if  you 
tell  her." 

With  all  his  hot  love  for  his  wife,  his  sister 
was  not  only  juster,  but  more  generous,  to 
Bella  in  that  moment. 

"She  could  not,  after  what  has  transpired," 
Mrs.  Markham  said — "she  could  not,  Claude; 
there  shall  be  no  fuss,  if  you  fear  that.  I  can't 
forget  that  the  families  have  been  friendly  for 
years  before  either  of  us  was  born — I  can't 
forget,"  she  continued,  waxing  a  little  warmer, 
"that  I  once  hoped  to  see  them  united;  but 
above  all,  -I  can't  forget  that  Grace  is  not  wor- 
thy to  touch  your  wife's  hand !" 

"  I  don't  think  that  she  is  myself,"  Claude 
replied.  "It  was  devilish  mean,  and  no  mis- 
take !  but  you  women  are  queer  animals  when 
you  get  a  jealous  fit  on!"  By  the  light  of 
which  speech  Mrs.  Markham  read  that  her 
brother  was  more  lenient  to  Miss  Grace's  perfidy 
than  she  (Mrs.  Markham)  herself;  more  lenient 
also  than  he  would  have  been  had  that  perfidy 
not  been  the  offspring  of  an  unhealthy  passion 
for  himself.  He  detested  and  despised  Miss 
Harper;  but  he  remembered,  through  all  that 
detestation  and  contempt,  that  Grace  Harper 
loved  him.  A  woman  never  forgives  and  never 
likes  a  man  who  acts,  meanly  and  basely,  even 
for  love  of  her,  to  th<ypan  she  loves ;  but  a  man 
placed  in  similar  circumstances  with  relation  to 
a  brace  of  women,  feels  differently,  and  is  more 
merciful.  He  forgets  the  base  meanness,  re- 
members the  love  alone,  and  is  lenient.  In 
fact,  he  is  a  little  more  selfish  and  a  little  nobler 
than  a  woman  can  possibly  be. 

"We  won't  talk  about  what  her  reason  might 
have  been  for  having  acted  as  she  has  acted, 
Claude.  All  I  say  is,  that  she  shall  never  be 
thrust  upon  your  wife  again  through  me,"  Mrs. 
Markham  replied. 


CHAPTER  XLYIII. 
A  HUSBAND'S  FIRST  GIFT. 

FLORENCE  was  married  I  She  was  Mrs.  Chester 
now ;  and  that  proud  destiny  being  achieved, 
far  more  toleration  was  shown  to  her  weakness 
respecting  Stanley  than  had  been  shown  for- 
merly. More  toleration  was  shown  to  her 
weakness;  but  for  all  that  Lady  Villars  took  an 
early  opportunity  of  suggesting  to  the  happy 
bridegroom  that  he  kept  a  tight  hand  on  his 
oride  in  the  matter,  and  made  no  rash  promises 
under  the  influence  of  pardonable  emotion. 

The  toleration  that  was  shown  to  Florence 
was  shown  in  this  way.  When  Mrs.  Chester 
went  up  to  change  her  wedding  dress  for  a  tra- 
velling one,  Carrie  accompanied  her  out  of  the 
fulness  of  sisterly  affection.  Carrie  was  uncom- 
monly well  pleased  with  her  own  share  in  this 
business  which  had  come  to  a  climax  to-day. 
There  had  been  no  forcing  of  a  girl's  inclination 
in  the  matter,  she  told  herself  and  Gerald ;  she 


ON  GUARD. 


15? 


had  only  trained  and  pruned  Florry's  affections 
in  a  suitable  direction,  and  taught  Florry  the 
tractable  to  feel  that  there  was  sin  in  suffering 
the  thought  of  "  what  might  have  been  "  with 
Claude  Walsingham  to  stand  in  the  way  of  a 
very  good  thing. 

Florry  was  loving,  gentle,  womanly,  and 
good ;  she  was  also  much  given  to  seeing  the 
things  that  were  shown  to  her.  Now,  some 
women,  equally  well-endowed  with  her  in  other 
respects,  are  not  blessed  with  that  safest  gift 
for  their  sex  of  seeing  selected  sights,  and  find- 
ing them  good.  But  Florence  having  found 
brambles  and  stumbling-blocks  in  the  path  she 
had  elected  to  follow  of  her  own  accord,  when 
starting  in  life — having  been  sorely  torn  and 
bruised  thereby — came  back  repentant,  and 
ready  to  be  guided  by  Carrie  for  the  fu- 
ture. 

It  must  be  confessed  that  Carrie  guided  her 
well,  all  things  considered.  Lady  Yillars  was 
well  acquainted  with  the  materials  which  Fate 
placed  in  her  plump  hands  to  mould  according 
to  her  will.  The  path  to  the  entrance  of  which 
she  led  Florry,  and  along  which  she  gave  Florry 
a  gentle  impetus  when  the  ground  seemed 
heavy,  was  an  open,  moderately  pleasant,  tho- 
roughly safe  one.  It  was  the  best,  perhaps,  that 
Florry  could  have  travelled,  after  having  "made 
tracks"  in  the  wrong  direction  formerly.  It 
was  moderately  pleasant  and  thoroughly  safe, 
and  the  man  who  was  to  be  her  companion 
along  it  was  as  lovable,  in  his  love  for  her  and 
pride  in  her,  as  any  man  could  have  been  com- 
ing after  Claude. 

"  You  have  made  me  so  happy,  dear  1"  Lady 
Villars  said,  giving  Florry  a  discreet  little  hug 
that  expressed  affection  for  the  bride,  and  con- 
sideration for  the  bride's  veil.  "You  have 
made  me  so  happy,  dear !  and  you  look  50 
nice !" 

"  I  am  glad  of  that,  Carrie :  you've  been  so 
kind  to  me." 

In  her  natural  emotion  at  the  thought  of  the 
quickly  coming  parting,  Florence  remembered 
nothing  but  the  kind,  sweet  little  speeches 
Lady  Villars  had  been  in  the  habit  of  making  at 
divers  times  to  her.  She  forgot  the  hard  mean- 
ing those  speeches  had  sometimes  hidden.  So 
she  said  now,  "you've  been  so  kind  to  me," 
with  a  certain  sudden  swelling  and  reddening 
of  the  eyelids  that  betokened  the  approach  of 
rain. 

"  And  you've  made  Gerald  very  happy  too, 
my  darling,"  Lady  Yillars  continued.  "  Oh ! 
gracious!  how  tight  that  dress  is  round  the 
waist !  You've  made  Gerald  so  happy  !" 

"Dear  Gerald!"  Florence  replied,  hurriedly; 
"he's  always  so  good!  But  then  he  has  so 
much  to  make  him  happy !  Now,  there's  dear 
Stanley — i'f— he — could — only "  She  stop- 
ped, for  the  rain  had  come. 

"Don't,  don't  cry,  dear!"  Lady  Villars  said, 
soothingly ;  "  it's  very  natural  for  you  to  feel  so, 
though,  very  natural  indeed.  "Who  could  have 
believed  that  Stanley  would  ever  have  so  heart- 
lessly lost  sight  of  us  all?" 

"  Oh,  Carrie!  you  don't  know  Stanley!" 

"You  must  remember  you  are  a  married 

woman  now,  dear,"  Lady  Villars  resumed,  pa- 

tronisingly;  "you  must  be  very  careful  not  to 

give  way  to  any  false  sentimentality,  not  alone 


on  your  own  account,  but  on  Mr.  Chester's. 
You  will  be  more  on  your  guard  though,  I'm 
sure,  than  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  is." 

""What  is  she  doing?" 

"I  can't  tell  you  now.  "What  I  was  going  to 
say  is,  don't  try  to  work  on  Fred  about  Stanley, 
because  that  wouldn't  be  fair,  and  he  would  feel 
that  it  wasn't  fair.  I  need  not  caution  you 
though,  dear;  your  own  good  heart  will  pre- 
serve you." 

As  Lady  Villars  did  not  state  from  what 
Florence's  own  good  heart  would  preserve  her, 
Florence  went  down  with  that  sensation  of 
elastic  merit  which  is  apt  to  come  over  the  re- 
cipient of  sketchy  "honourable  mentions." 

Her  good  heart  was  touched  to  tears  of  grate- 
ful loving  joy  when  she  found  herself  alone  in 
the  carriage  with  her  husband  at  last.  He  took 
up  a  black  leather  case  that  was  lying  by  his 
side,  and  after  handling  it  in  apparent  uncer- 
tainty for  a  few  moments,  he  said — 

"Flo,  my  darling,  I  thought  this  should  be 
your  first  present  from  your  husband." 

As  he  spoke,  he  put  a  splendidly  bound  copy 
of  Stanley's  novel  into  her  lap,  and  won  his  wife 
to  himself  entirely,  and  for  ever. 

It  was  no  stroke  of  genius,  it  was  no  subtle 
plan,  it  was  no  pre-arranged  sensational  effect. 
It  was  simply  a  bit  of  pure  good  feeling  for  the 
girl  he  loved,  designed  to  show  her  that  'he  was 
not  utterly  regardless  of  her  feelings  at  not  hav- 
ing been  suffered  to  ask  her  pet  brother  to  her 
marriage.  As  such,  it  was  accepted :  as  such, 
it  was  repaid. 

It  may  easily  be  imagined  how  Florence  leant 
upon  his  shoulder  and  cried  then  copiously, 
thanking  him  for  what  he  had  done,  and,  like 
a  woman,  asking  him  to  do  more.  That  en- 
treaty of  Carrie's  that  Fred  might  not  be  worked 
upon  was  utterly  disregarded  now ;  and  Fred 
showed  himself  to  be  very  ready  to  be  worked 
upon,  rather  to  like  it,  in  fact. 

"  He  shall  be  a  great  deal  with  us  as  soon  as 
ever  we  come  back — shan't  he,  Fred?" 

"  Eather !  I  should  think  so !"  Mr.  Chester 
replied.  Then  there  came  an  interruption ;  they 
were  compelled  to  get  out  at  the  terminus ;  but 
as  soon  as  they  were  seated  in  the  railway  car- 
riage, and  the  train  was  moving  on,  the  conver- 
sation was  resumed. 

"  I  don't  want  you  to  think  either  Gerald  or 
Carrie  unkind  to  him  at  all,  Fred,  but  Carrie 
has  prejudices ;  she  is  very  good  herself,  and 
she  has  no  patience  with  other  people  who  are 
not  equally  good." 

Mr.  Chester  looked  rather  keenly  for  him  at 
his  wife. 

"  "What  prejudiced  her  against  Stanley  in  tli 
first  place,  Flo?" 

"  I  don't  know ;  she'll  get  over  it.  You  dear 
boy"  (taking  up  her  books  with  effusion),  "  I'm 
so 'happy." 

There  was  nothing  more  said  about  any  per 
son  not  present  for  a  time ;  the  brother  was 
forgotten  in  the  book,  and  the  happiness  the  gift 
of  the  book  had  greatly  enhanced.  But  at  last 
Mr.  Chester  said,  with  an  amount  of  decision 
he  was  almost  surprised  at  himself  for  display- 
in0*— 

"And,  Flo,  dear,  give  Lady  Villars  to  under- 
stand clearly  that  you're  mistress  in  your  own 
house.  I'll  have  no  interference." 


158 


ON  GUARD. 


"She  will  never  try  to  interfere,  I  think," 
Florence  replied. 

"  That's  right ;  but  let  her  see  from  the  first 
that  you're  mistress  in  your  own  house,  Flo — 
it  will  save  trouble." 

"We  are  seeing  the  last  of  Florence  now.  She 
has  started  on  the  journey  of  life  fairly  enough. 
Her  life  looked  bright  before  her  on  that  wed- 
ding morning — all  the  brighter  that  the  prospect 
was  hers  of  making  Stanley's  life  happier  on 
her  return  from  the  inevitable  tour  she  was 
about  to  take.  Her  life  looked  bright  before 
her;  and  bright  it  will  probably  be.  She 
was  not  one  to  indulge  in  vain  regrets  for 
having  declined  on  "  a  range  of  lower  feelings 
and  a  narrower  heart"  than  she  had  thought 
to  rest  upon  once.  The  feelings  were  warm  to- 
wards her,  and  the  heart  was  broad  enough  to 
hold  her  well,  and  to  honour  her  highly.  She  will 
be  a  happy  woman,  and  when  she  looks  upon 
her  children,  the  very  memory  will  be  dead 
within  her  that  she  ever  loved  another  than 
their  father. 

When  Mrs.  Markham  had  talked  over  the 
subject  of  that  letter,  and  the  cause  of  it,  and 
the  writer  of  it,  with  her  brother,  she  came  to 
the  conclusion  that  it  would  be  better  to  keep 
silence  as  to  her  discovery,  both  to  Bella  and 
Grace  Harper,  till  the  latter  was  back  with  her 
own  people. 

"  She  shall  travel  back  with  me,"  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  said  to  Claude ;  "  you  and  Bella  can  fol- 
low." 

"Very  well,"  he  replied. 

"  When  I  get  down  there  I  shall  give  her  to 
understand  that  I  have  found  her  out,  the  mean, 
malicious  monkey !  and  that  she  had  better 
never  attempt  to  show  her  face  at  the  Court.  I 
shall  not  say  a  word  to  Bella  while  Miss  Harper 
is  her  guest ;  but  it  will  only  be  fair  to  Bella  to 
suffer  Miss  Harper  to  be  her  guest  as  short  a 
time  as  possible." 

"  As  you  like,  Ellen.  There's  no  harm  done, 
though,  remember:  so  hold  your  punishing 
hand ;  don't  make  it  too  heavy."  Claude  could 
not  be  quite  oblivious  that  the  wrong  had  been 
wrought  for  love  of  him.  He  was  scarcely  the 
man  to  have  sent  Stanley  Villars  to  destruction 
for,  after  all. 

"It  can't  be  made  too  heavy.  The  base 
wickedness  of  the  girl  we  all  thought  so  good 
frightens  me." 

"There's  no  harm  done,  as  I  said  before," 
Claude  replied.  "Mine  was  the  worst  fault 
after  all.  I  was  a  fool  to  pay  the  slightest  at- 
tention to  what  any  one  said  of  a  woman  I 
know  as  well  as  I  do  Bella.  She  deserved  bet- 
ter of  me." 

"  She  deserved  better  of  us  all,"  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  replied.  She  did  not  like  her  sister-in-law, 
nevertheless  she  would  be  just.  Bella  had  de- 
served better  of  them  all.  Mrs.  Markham 
would  be  the  first  to  acknowledge  it. 

"  She  deserved  better  of  us  all,  Claude,"  she 
said  emphatically. 

"  Well,  render  her  the  '  better '  now— it's  not 
too  late.  As  I  said  before,  there  is  no  harm 
done,"  Claude  replied,  rising  up.  "  Come,"  he 
continued,  "  having  settled  that  business,  let  us 
go  in  and  see  if  Bella  has  a  cup  of  tea  for 
us." 

So  it  came   to  pass  that  they  walked  into 


the  drawing-room  together,  rather  to  Bella's 
amazement. 

The  evening  passed  rather  heavily.  Claude 
talked  to  his  wife  for  a  short  time — talked  to 
her  in  a  lover-like,  devotional  way,  that  is  very 
delightful  to  a  woman ;  but  he  got  tired  of  talk- 
ing to  her  in  this  way,  long,  long  before  she 
got  tired  of  listening  to  him ;  and  then  he  went 
to  sleep  over  a  Quarterly  Review  in  a  fat  arm- 
chair, and  the  evening  commenced  being  very 
dreary. 

How  could  the  evening  pass  other  than 
heavily  indeed?  Claude  was  asleep.  Bella 
aggrieved.  Mrs.  Markham  engaged  in  uproot- 
ing one  of  the  traditions  of  her  youth,  which 
was,  that  a  being  whom  she  had  elected  to 
honour,  and  who  belonged,  moreover,  to  one  of 
the  county  families,  couldn't  err.  And  Miss 
Grace  Harper  was  uneasy  in  a  semi-conscious 
manner,  having  a  conviction  that  she  had  been 
found  out,  and  not  being  sure  by  whom  she  had 
been  so.  The  evening  passed  heavily,  very 
heavily  indeed.  They  were  all  glad  when 
Claude  roused  himself  from  the  depths  of  the 
fat  chair  and  exclaimed,  "By  Jove!  how  late 
it  is,  Bella!  Had  you  any  idea  of  it?" 

He  drew  his  wife's  hand  down  on  to  the  arm 
of  the  fat  chair  as  he  spoke,  and  patted  it,  look- 
ing into  her  face  the  while,  as  he  had  been 
wont  to  look  when  he  was  "  Major  Walsing- 
ham  "  to  her,  and  she  only  "  Bella  Vane."  And 
Grace  Harper  saw  that  he  did  this,  and  felt  that 
after  all  there  were  some  things  that  might  as 
well  have  been  left  undone,  as  this  was  the  end 
of  it. 

The  two  ladies,   Mrs.   Markham  and  Mis 
Harper,  journeyed  down  together  to  the  Corn- 
on  the  following  day,  leaving  Claude  and  hi 
wife  to  follow.     The  widowed  Mrs.  Walsing 
ham  met  her  old  favourite  with  a  warmth  0- 
affection  that  it  rather  grated  on  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham's  nerves  to  witness,  and  that  contrasted 
harshly  with  the  tone  in  which  the  mother 
said — 

"So  my  son's  wife  has  not  thought  fit  to 
come  to  me  in  my  trouble.  Ah,  well !  I  might 
have  expected  it." 

"  Claude  and  his  wife  will  be  here  to-morrow, 


"  Claude  at  kast  might  have  escorted  Grace 
and  you,  I  think." 

"And  left  his  wife  to  follow  by  herself?  No, 
indeed ;  Claude  values  Bella  too  highly  to  neg- 
lect her  in  such  a  way,"  Mrs.  Markham  replied, 
decisively. 

"  My  dear  child,  you  will  stay  with  me  to- 
night, will  you  not?"  Mrs.  Walsingham  asked 
of  Grace—  "  your  dear  mother  will  spare  you  to 
me  to-night?" 

"I  have  no  doubt  that  her  dear  mother 
would  do  so,"  Mrs.  Markham  interposed;  "but 
I  believe  it  is  arranged  that  Grace  goes  home 
to-night." 

"  That  arrangement  might  be  broken  through," 
Mrs.  Walsingham  said;  and  then  Mrs.  Markham 
spoke  rather  sternly,  and  Grace  Harper  knew 
that  her  days  of  favour  at  the  Court  were 
over. 

"  That  arrangement  had  better  not  be  broken 
through,  mother.  Grace  will  agree  with  me 
that  it  will  be  well  that  she  should  not  remain 
to  meet  my  brother  and  his  wife." 


ON  GUARD. 


159 


"  Oh !  I  can  go  home,  of  course,"  Grace  said, 
hurriedly.  "I  really  never  thought  of  staying 
— only  dear  Mrs.  Walsinghanj  seemed  to  wish 
me  to  stay." 

Mrs.  Walsingham  looked  from  her  daughter 
to  her  guest.  "  What  is  all  this  ?"  she  ask- 
ed. 

"  You  had  better  not  ask  now,  mamma." 

"It  means  that  Mrs.  Markham — my — own — 
old  friend,  has  been  influenced  by  your  daugh- 
ter-in  law  into  conceiving  an  unfounded  dislike 
to  me,"  Grace  exclaimed,  "I  have  known  all 
along  that  Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  did  not  like 
me,  but  I  never  thought  she  would  have  been 
so  mean " 

"Perhaps  the  less  said  about  'jneanness' 
the  better,"  Mrs.  Markham  said,  in  her  most 
commonplace,  resolute  tones.  "  I  certainly  have 
no  desire  to  make  things  worse  by  talking  about 
them ;  but  I  think  Grace  will  tell  you,  mam- 
ma," she  continued,  fixing  her  eyes  steadily  on 
Grace — "I  think  Grace  will  tell  you,  mamma, 
that  she  can  never  be  Mrs.  Claude  Walsing- 
ham's  guest  again;  and  you  must  know,"  she 
added,  quietly,  ''painful  as  the  knowledge  may 
be  to  you,  that  when  Mrs.  Claude  arrives  at  the 
Court,  it  will  be  as  the  mistress  of  it." 

Then  old  Mrs.  Walsingham  bewailed  herself 
afresh,  and  in  the  sadder  access  of  sorrow 
caused  by  this  reminder  which  her  intensely 
just  daughter  had  given  her,  she  suffered  the 
vexed  question  of  Grace's  staying  or  leaving  to 
be  settled  without  further  intervention  on  her 
part. 

Miss  Harper  recovered  her  equanimity — her 
stolidity,  rather — very  soon.  "  If  the  carriage 
is  ready  to  take  me  on,  I'll  go  home  now.  It 
isn't  nice  arriving  so  very  late  at  night,  and  it 
will  be  very  late  if  I  stay  any  longer,"  she  said, 
after  the  expiration  of  a  few  minutes. 

She  kissed  Mrs.  Walsingham,  who  was  still 
plunged  in  grief  at  the  thought  of  her  son's 
wife  reigning  in  her  stead,  and  then  she  held 
out  a  hand  that  was  rather  tremulous  to  Mrs. 
Markham  in  farewell. 

"I'll  see  you  out  into  the  hall,"  the  latter  re- 
plied, stalking  away  to  the  door  in  a  grim  way 
that  told  Grace  she  was  to  hear  the  truth  at 
length. 

As  soon  as  they  reached  the  hall,  Mrs.  Mark- 
ham  put  her  hand  on  Grace's  arm,  and  sank 
her  voice  to  a  whisper — 

"  I  never  was  more  shocked  and  sorry  in  my 
life  than  I  was  by  the  finding  of  that  piece  of 
paper,"  she  said,  handing  the  envelope  to  Grace. 
"Don't  say  a  word  either  in  deprecation  or 
denial,  for  I  shouldn't  believe  you.  You  will 
never  come  here  again,  of  course  ?  " 

"I  shall  never  care  to  come  here  again," 
Grace  replied,  in  a  very  hard  tone.  "You 
needn't  trouble  yourself  to  put  Mrs.  Claude  on 
her  guard  against  me,"  she  continued,  crum- 
pling up  the  envelope.  "Let  us  leave  each 
other  off  without  a  scene,  please." 

"It's  the  last  favour  I  can  ever  do  you — I 
will." 

"  You  don't  mean  to  be  friendly  with  me, 
then,  any  more?" 

"No I"  Mrs.  Markham  replied,  sharply ;  " 
think  you're  the  basest  woman  I  know:  but 
I'll  not  betray  you  to  my  mother ;  if  you  really 
care  about  her  friendship,  you  shall  not  bo  de- 


prived of  it,  if  you'll  promise  not  to  attempt  to 
poison  her  mind  against  Claude's  wife." 

"I  don't  care  about  keeping  it — you  needn't 
suppose  I  valued  any  of  you  on  your  own  ac- 
counts— it  was  all  for  Claude !  "  the  girl  said, 
sullenly ;  then  she  passed  on  without  another 
word  to  the  carriage  that  was  awaiting  her. 
Thus  ended  her  connection  with  the  Walsing- 
ham family,  and  with  my  story. 


CHAPTER  XLIX. 

THE  END. 

WHEN  Claude  Walsingham  and  his  wife  arrived 
at  the  Court,  Bella  found  herself  very  delicately 
situated.  Everything  that  was  to  be  said  to 
Mrs.  Walsingham,  Claude  told  Bella  to  say. 
"  It  was  her  duty,"  he  said  to  her,  "and  there- 
fore she  must  fulfil  it."  She  was  most  anxious 
to  fulfil  her  duty  and  please  her  husband,  but 
she  did  find  it  rather  hard  to  be  compelled  to 
make  "what  was  to  be"  manifest  to  Mrs.  Wal- 
singham, who  would  have  learnt  the  lesson 
much  more  readily  from  her  son. 

After  the  funeral,  Claude  said  to  his  wife,  "  I 
wish  you  would  get  my  mother  down  to  the 
village,  Bella,  to  look  over  the  house;  she 
could  point  out  to  you  what  she  would  like  to 
have  done  before  she  goes  to  it,  better  than  she 
could  to  me." 

"Very  well,  Claude,"  Bella  rejoined ;  "will 
you  ask  her  to  go  ?  " 

"  No ;  it  will  be  much  more  gracious  of  you 
to  ask  her  to  go." 

"  She  won't  walk,  of  course  ?  " 

"  It  would  do  her  good — an  immense  deal  of 
good  if  she  would  walk,"  Claude  replied ;  "  dear 
old  lady,  she  wants  rousing !  " 

"I  really  think  we  had  better  wait  till  we 
come  back  from  Scotland,  Claude,"  Bella  plead- 
ed. "  I'm  sure  your  mother  will  hate  me  for 
hinting  a  word  about  the  house  yet." 

"  And  have  the  business  hanging  over  our 
heads  the  whole  time  we're  away  1  That's  just 
like  a  woman — avoid  an  unpleasantness,  at  any 
cost,  as  long  as  you  can !  No,  it  will  bo  much 
better  to  get  the  thing  over.  I  didn't  think 
you  were  so  weak,  Bella,  as  to  shrink  from  it. 
I  don't." 

"  Ah !  I  feel  so  for  her,"  Bella  replied.  When 
she  commenced  her  speech  she  had  intended 
saying,  "  Ah  i  but  you  don't  do  it  yourself,  you 
put  it  off  upon  me."  But  she  waived  that  in- 
tention. 

"  So  do  I,  dear  old  mother  1  but  as  the  thing 
must  be  done  (for  she'd  be  wretched  after  a 
time  in  a  house  of  which  she  wasn't  both  real 
and  nominal  mistress),  it  had  better  be  dono 
quickly.  Find  out  how  she'd  like  the  place 
furnished,  and  show  yourself  interested,  there's 
a  dear  girl." 

Bella  promised,  and  Bella  tried  to  perform; 
but  she  merely  won  wrath  to  herself  during  the 
whole  course  of  the  transaction.  "  It  is  clearly 
not  my  own  dear  boy  who  wishes  to  get  rid  of 
me,"  the  widowed  mother  observed  to  Mrs. 
Markham ;  "  it's  his  wife.  She  is  hurrying  me 
away  with  the  most  indecent  haste ;  she  has 


160 


ON  GUARD. 


just  asked  me  to  go  to  the  village  with  her,  and 
see  if  I  can't  suggest  some  alterations  in  the 
Vale  House.  I  know  what  that  means !" 

Of  course  they  knew  what  it  meant.  Mrs. 
Claude  knew  what  it  meant  herself — namely, 
that  her  mother-in-law  was  to  be  made  as  com- 
fortable as  possible,  and  that  she  (Bella)  was  to 
bear  the  brunt  of  bringing  those  comforts  into 
working  order.  It  was  horribly  unpleasant  to 
her  to  be  regarded  as  one  who  was  unduly  im- 
patient to  reign,  simply  because  she  obeyed  her 
husband,  and  strove  to  make  things  as  pleasant 
as  possible  to  the  one  who  was  dethroned.  It 
was  horribly  unpleasant ;  but  Bella  was  wiser 
in  her  generation  than  she  had  been  in  the  days 
when  we  first  made  her  acquaintance,  and  she 
bore  the  unpleasantness  meekly,  as  being  a  por- 
tion of  a  young  wife's  lot — at  least,  the  lot  of 
all  young  wives  whose  lives  are  cast  in  the 
vicinity  of  their  husbands'  mothers. 

Mrs.  Walsingham,  senior,  hated  the  Vale 
House  vehemently  from  the  moment  she  looked 
upon  it  with  the  eyes  of  its  future  occupant. 
"  I'm  confident  that  I  saw  a  black  beetle  in  the 
kitchen,"  she  said  to  Bella,  as  they  were  going 
up-stairs  to  look  at  the  bed-rooms.  "  However, 
the  place  is  good  enough  for  me!"  She  said 
that  the  place  was  good  enough  for  her  in  a 
tone  that  made  Bella  long  to  cry  out,  "  And  for 
me  too,  if  I'm  only  permitted  to  inhabit  it  alone; 
you  go  back  to  the  Court  and  be  happy."  But 
though  she  longed  to  say  this  with  the  longing 
that  comes  upon  one  after  having  been  com- 
pelled to  listen  to  the  plaints  of  a  discontented 
one  for  a  time,  she  held  her  peace,  remembering 
that  the  Court  was  not  hers  to  give  away  mag- 
nanimously, and  that  she  would  only  rule  in  it 
herself  through  the  grace  of  Claude  the  great. 

But  she  would  be  sorely  harassed  before  she 
assumed  the  robes  of  queen-regnant,  of  that  she 
felt  very  certain;  the  sovereign  to  be  deposed  was 
so  very  sensitive,  not  to  say  litigious,  and  the 
black  beetles  were  so  numerous,  and  the  whole 
atmosphere  of  the  Vale  House  so  charged  with 
quarrelling  matter.  "  If  Claude  would  only 
speak  out  to  his  mother,  and  have  done  with 
it,"  Bella  thought  wearily,  when  Mrs.  Walsing- 
ham  pointed  out  the  tenth  draught,  and  de- 
clared herself  for  the  fortieth  time  ready  and 
willing  to  submit  to  anything,  no  matter  how 
unendurable — "  If  Claude  would  only  speak  out 
to  his  mother  and  have  done  with  it,  instead  of 
making  me  'imply,'  and  'hint,'  and  do  all  sorts 
of  things  that  she  hates  me  for  doing." 

But  Claude  would  not  speak  out.  Things 
were  going  very  well,  according  to  his  mind. 
His  mother  had  been  given  to  know  that  there 
could  not  be  two  queens  at  the  Court,  and  that 
it  would  be  well,  therefore,  that  she  should  take 
up  her  abode  at  the  Vale  House.  To  the  best 
of  his  belief,  his  mother  had  acquiesced  very 
calmly  and  affably  in  this  arrangement.  He 
had  heard  nothing  of  the  draughts  and  the 
black  beetles.  Bella  to  the  best  of  her  ability 
kept  disagreeables,  which  he  could  not  remedy, 
from  his  knowledge. 

The  day  of  their  departure  for  the  Highlands 
arrived,  and  they  started,  leaving  all  things  in 
good  order.  It  was  clearly  understood  now 
that  old  Mrs.  Walsingham  should  be  found  in- 
stalled at  the  Vale  House  on  their  return.  "  I 
suppose  your  wife  will  not  let  you  stay  much 


at  the  Court.  Claude,  with  her  tastes  and  her 
habits,"  Mrs.  Walsingham  observed  to  her  son. 
"  However,  though  she  may  not  be  here  much, 
I'm  better  out  of  the  way,  and  I  know  it." 

"That's  nonsense,  mother,"  Claude  replied. 
"  But  what  makes  you  think  we  shall  not  be 
here  much  ?  we  mean  to  be  here  altogether." 

"  Oh,  do  you!  then  I'm  very  much  mistaken, 
Claude.  Those  who  live  longest  will  see 
most!" 

To  which  unanswerable  argument  Claude  re- 
plied nothing.  His  mother  was  in  the  injured 
frame  of  mind,  and  his  experience  of  women 
led  him  to  avoid  them  at  such  times  and  in 
such  conditions. 

Mrs.  Markham,  too,  had  a  few  words  with 
her  brother  before  he  left  for  Scotland. 

"You  know,  Claude,  that  though  I  don't 
profess  much  love  for  Bella,  I  always  do  her 
justice?"  she  began. 

He  nodded.  "  I'm  not  going  to  interfere  in 
any  feminine  squabbles,"  he  said.  "  If  you 
can't  hit  it  off  with  Bella,  you  had  better  not 
come  in  her  way,  Ellen." 

"  But  I  can  '  hit  it  off,'  as  you  call  it,  with 
Bella ;  there  is  no  reason  existing  why  I  should 
not  hit  it  off  with  her — in  other  words,  behave 
in  a  very  friendly  way  towards  her,  as  a  sister 
should ;  but  I  want  to  warn  you " 

"What  the  devil  about  now  ?" 

"  Don't  let  her  mix  herself  up  with  that  man 
she  was  engaged  to — that  Mr.  Villars ;  I  don't 
say  that  harm  would  come  of  it " 

"Well,  I  should  rather  hope  you  don't  say 
so,  indeed!" 

"  No,  I  don't,  Claude ;  but  harm  may  come 
of  it.  I  don't  like  his  ideas,  and  he  might  graft 
them  upon  Bella,  eventually.  His  ideas  strike 
me  as  being  shocking." 

"Why?" 

Then  Mrs.  Markham  said  something  about 
Stanley  Villars  being  "  evidently  a  free-thinker 
and  an  atheist,"  in  the  vilely  inhuman  way 
people  are  apt  to  denounce  others  whose  faith 
they  cannot  gauge,  and  whose  belief  is  broader, 
deeper,  nobler  than  their  own,  in  that  it  be- 
lieves in  the  "  good  that  is  in  all  men,"  and  in 
the  mercy  of  God  towards  all  his  creatures. 
Mrs.  Markham  had  gathered  that  Stanley  Vil- 
lars was  not  travelling  along  the  road  to  eter- 
nity in  the  same  class  carriage  as  herself;  there- 
fore, she  declared  him  to  be  a  lost  sheep,  and 
settled  the  question  as  to  his  ultimate  destina- 
tion definitely  in  her  own  mind,  after  the  man- 
ner of  bitter  Christians. 

"That's  all  nonsense;  but  I  don't  fancy 
Bella  will  care  to  see  any  more  of  them.  She 
believed  him  to  be  dying,  or  some  stuff  of  the 
kind ;  it  cured  her  when  I  told  her  I  had  seen 
him  drunk  in  the  Strand.  Good  God!  how 
low  the  fellow's  fallen !" 

So  Claude  Walsingham  spoke  of  his  old 
friend,  as  he  strapped  one  of  the  rugs  that  were 
going  with  him  to  Scotland  a  little  tighter. 
And  then  he  went  to  see  if  his  wife  was  ready 
to  start,  and  presently  they  were  off. 

But  I  must  gather  the  scattered  threads  of 
my  story  together,  before  I  tell  you  how  the 
Claude  Walsinghams  enjoyed  their  trip  into 
Scotland,  and  what  they  heard  there. 

When  Stanley  Villars  turned  down  that  nar- 
row street  that  led  from  the  Strand  to  the 


ON  GUAED. 


161 


river,  there  was  but  one  thought  in  his  mind, 
and  that  one  was,  "  how  he  should  get  out  of 
it  all  most  speedily. "  You  see  it  was  < '  all  up  " 
with  him  (how  lightly  we  use  and  hear  the 
phrase  occasionally,  never  thinking  of  its  deep, 
its  terrible  meaning)— it  was  "all  up"  with 
him.  "  "Was  it  not  pitiful,  near  a  whole  city- 
full,  friends  he  had  none  1" 

Morosely  he  went  along  down  to  a  pier, 
where  a  river  boat  was  waiting  to  discharge 
and  take  in  passengers.  There  was  a  band  on 
board  the  boat,  pouring  out  blithe  strains ;  and 
he  stood  and  listened,  only  because  he  could 
not  go  down  and  drown  himself  before  that 
gay  company.  The  old  habit  of  courtesy  was 
upon  the  man  still,  even  in  this  hour  of  blackest 
despair.  He  could  not  mar  the  festivity  that 
appeared  to  be  reigning  amongst  the  crowd  on 
board  that  boat,  by  a  splash,  and  a  sinking 
under,  by  causing  that  horrible  sound,  "  Man 
overboard !"  to  arise. 

_  So  he  waited  there,  leaning  against  the 
ticket-vendor's  shed  upon  the  pier.  He  was 
too  weak  to  stand,  almost;  and  as  he  leant 
there,  fatigue,  and  the  music,  and  the  glare  on 
the  water  (for  the  sun  was  on  it  still),  made 
him  sleepy,  and  caused  him  to  shrink  from  the 
exertion  of  drowning  himself  at  once. 

"If  I  could  only  have  a  sleep  first,"  he 
thought.  "My  God!  when  did  I  sleep  last  ?— 
not  for  weeks!" 

It  was  true,  this,  or  partially  true.  He  had 
not  entirely  forgotten  himself  and  his  misery 
for  weeks.  The  power  of  sleep  was  gone  from 
him.  He  was  awfully  open-eyed,  shockingly 
conscious  of  a  continual  dull  pain  in  the  back 
of  the  head.  Ah !  that  dull  pain  that  comes 
on  after  many  hours'  continuous  brain-labour ! 
You  who  know  what  it  is,  "make  no  deep 
scrutiny  into  his  mutiny,"  for  he  had  suffered 
from  it  long 

By-and-by  that  boat,  with  its  band,  telling 
how  happy  it  could  be  in  the  Strand  for  ever- 
more with  Naucy,  passed  on,  and  another 
bumped  against  the  pier  in  its  stead,  shaking 
him  from  his  resting  pi-ace  as  it  bumped,  and 
making  him  feel  that  he  must  take  a  little  rest 
before  he  could  get  to  the  water's  edge,  and 
take  the  final  plunge.  So  he  sat  down,  making 
a  pillow  of  his  arm  upon  a  stout  post,  that  was 
used  to  fasten  the  boats'  ropes  to  sometimes, 
and  prepared  to  take  the  requisite  rest. 

He  was  very  weak — entirely  worn  out  by 
grief,  despair,  and  hunger,  for  he  had  been  fast- 
ing, from  sheer  forgetfulness,  the  whole  day. 
Soon  he  slept,  lying  there,  pillowing  his  head 
on  a  rude  plank,  like  the  outcast  he  felt  himself 
to  be — he  who,  but  a  year  ago,  had  had  so 
bright  a  fate  before  him  !* 

The  piermen,  passing  and  re  passing  him, 
looked  down  upon  him  with  the  sort  of  good- 
natured  contempt  that  is  showt  to  mangy  dogs, 
beggars,  and  the  like. 

"  He's  a  rum'un  to  choose  this  place  of  all 
others  for  his  afternoon  nap,''  one  of  them  said 
to  a  comrade.  And  the  comrade  replied,  "Ay, 
poor  fellow!  just  heave  that  sack  over  him; 
we'll  lay  it  across  him ;  the  river  breeze  is  a 
sharp'un  this  evening." 

So,  there,  with  an  old  coal-sack  over  his  shoul- 
ders, Stanley  Villars  lay  sleeping,  at  about  the 
same  hour  that  Claude  Walsingham  was  wring- 
11 


ing  the  promise  from  Bella  to  "  have  no  more  to 
do  with  him." 

For  at  least  a  couple  of  hours  that  sleep  of  his 
lasted.  Then  a  man,  in  passing  from  one  of  the 
boats  to  the  steps,  paused  to  look  at  the  re- 
cumbent form,  and  with  a  cry  of— 

"  Good  God,  Villars  1  how  came  you  here!" 
roused  him. 

"Ah,  Bligh!  is  that  you?"  Stanley  asked, 
rising  up. 

"Yes,  I  have  been  to  Gravesend  with  a 
party;  they're  gone  on  now,  and  I  must  be 
after  them." 

"All  right!"  Stanley  replied. 

Suddenly,  Bligh  stopped.  "What  are  you 
doing  here?"  he  asked. 

"Nothing." 

"  What  are  you  going  to  do  ?" 

"Nothing." 

"  Why  don't  you  go  home,  then  ?"  Bligh  con- 
tinued. His  party  had  gone  on  now,  but  he 
did  not  care  for  that ;  he  was  determined  not  to 
lose  sight  of  Stanley  until  Stanley  had  rejoined 
his  wife. 

"  Why  don't  you  go  home  then?"  he  said. 

"  Home !  I  have  none,"  Stanley  replied,  think- 
ing only  of  Gerald's  house. 

"Nonsense!  come  along."  Then  Bligh  put 
his  arm  tnrough  Stanley's,  and  led  him  up  the 
steps,  and  took  him  home  in  a  cab,  and  never 
left  him  till  poor,  crying,  frightened  Marian  was 
hanging  over  him,  blessing  him  for  having 
"  come  back  to  her." 

The  record  of  the  days,  of  the  weeks,  that  en 
sued  would  be  mere  weariness.  A  portion  of 
his  mind  had  given  way  on  that  day  when  he 
turned  down  the  street  that  led  to  th  river,  and 
that  portion  was  never  restored.  It  was  miser- 
able for  the  only  two  who  were  with  him — his 
wife  and  Bligh — to  see  what  was  left  of  that 
mind  grow  daily  weaker  and  weaker ;  to  hear 
him  talking  in  a  way  that  they  kmw  he  would 
have  utterly  scorned  himself  for  talking  in,  had 
he  been  conscious  of  it ;  to  know  that  reason 
had  deserted  her  throne,  and  that  he  could 
never  now  be  "  himself  again." 

Sad,  miserably  sad,  to  see  him  writing,  with 
a  shaking  hand,  words  that  could  never  be 
printed;    to  see  him  making  these  up    and 
counting  the  lines,  and  calculating  the  iiumbe 
of  columns  they  would  make. 

It  was  very  sad  to  see  all  this,  and  to  feel 
themselves  called  upon  to  deceive  him  by  pre- 
tending that  his  "copy  "  was  sent,  and  inserted, 
and  paid  for,  in  order  to  give  ever  so  small  a 
gleam  of  satisfaction  to  his  poor  mind.  But 
through  all  the  sadness,  all  the  sorrow,  all  the 
biting,  horrible  despair  of  that  time,  the  baby- 
faced  beauty  nursed  him  with  a  loving,  untiring 
devotion,  that  at  last  won  him  to  know  her. 

She  knew  now  that  he  had  wrecked  himself 
for  another  woman  than  herself.  She  knew 
that  he  had  loved  that  other  woman  as  he 
never  could  have  loved  her  even  had  he  lived—- 
for he  wandered  much  in  his  mind,  and  told  the 
truth  in  his  ravings.  But  this  knowledge  never 
embittered  her — never  rendered  her  one  atom 
less  tender  in  her  devotion,  less  prompt  in  her 
service,  less  lovingly  grateful  to  him  for  calling 
her  to  him  constantly  as  he  did  with  the  words 
"  Marian,  pet." 
They  were  often  on  the  brink  of  bankruptcy, 


162 


ON  GUARD. 


but  Marian  kept  the  fact  of  their  being  so  from 
Stanley.  She  had  corne  to  feel  that  she  was  a 
sort  of  protecting  power  over  this  man — that 
she  was  stronger  in  many  ways  than  he,  and 
that  it  behoved  her  to  guard  him.  The  sense 
of  being  needful  to  him — the  sight  of  his  abso- 
lute reliance  upon  her  in  all  things — the  sad 
knowledge  that  he  had  none  other  upon  whom 
to  rely,  and  the  almost  equally  sad  knowledge 
that  he  had  lost  his  friends  in  gaining  her — all 
these  things  strung  her  up  to  bear  and  to  for- 
bear such  evils  as  none  but  those  who  have 
nursed  the  sick  unto  death  in  poverty  can  com- 
prehend. 

It  was  such  a  poor  small  bankruptcy,  that 
upon  the  brink  of  which  they  were  perpetually. 
They  failed  and  fell  short  of  such  inglorious, 
such  essential  things.  The  great  dread  grew 
up  in  her  heart  that,  brief  as  might  be  the  time 
he  had  yet  to  live,  he  might  be  made  to  feel 
the  want  that  was  upon  them  in  a  physical 
way,  that  it  was  a  terror  to  her  to  contemplate. 
But  she  kept  up  a  bright  air  before  him  inva- 
riably, though  generally  he  was  not  in  a  state 
to  see  anything  with  understanding — she  kept 
up  a  bright  air  before  him,  and  never  suffered 
a  tone  of  her  voice  to  fall  flat  on  his  ear.  It 
was  only  Bligh  who  saw  the  girlishness  fading 
from  her  day  by  day — who  heard  the  heart- 
wrung  tones  in  which  day  after  day  she  met 
him  at  the  door,  with  the  same  weary  tale  of 
"Stanley  being  no  better" — who  knew  that 
the  baby-faced  beauty  was  as  true  a  heroine  as 
any  of  the  gallant  women  of  ancient  or  modern 
times  whose  deeds  have  been  sung  melodious- 

17 

Now  that  she  knew  that  nothing  could  avert 
the  doom  that  was  upon  her  husband — the 
doom  of  early  death — she  grew  very  proud  for 
him,  and  resolved  to  suffer  anything,  no  matter 
how  bad,  herself,  rather  than  make  another 
appeal  on  his  behalf  to  his  family.  She  re- 
solved upon  something  else  too — resolved  upon 
it  with  no  flourish  of  trumpets — with  no  loudly- 
spoken  oaths— with  no  callings  of  any  one  to 
regard  with  admiration  the  magnitude  of  the 
sacrifice  she  was  determined  upon  making. 
She  came  to  her  decision  with  no  outward  sign, 
save  an  additional  tightening  of  her  lips,  as  she 
leant  over  him,  bathing  the  poor  head  that  had 
so  little  in  it  besides  ache  now.  But  she  was 
very  firmly  set  upon  carrying  out  her  decision, 
for  all  she  made  it  so  very,  very  quietly.  The 
guard  against  possible  communion  with  this 
girl  which  his  brother's  wife  had  wrought  upon 
his  family  to  erect  was  destined  to  be  never 
tried. 

Once  and  once  only  did  Stanley  Villars  refer 
to  the  bright  beautiful  bane  of  his  life  after 
that  visit  of  hers.  "She  never  sent  me  those 
roses,  you  see  ?"  he  said,  one  morning,  abrupt- 
ly, to  his  wife.  To  which  she  replied,  very 
sweetly,  despite  the  sore  feeling  that  would 
obtain  at  hearing  another  woman  mentioned  in 
a  way  that  proved  "  she  "  alone  had  occupied 
his  thoughts. 

"  But  she  will  send  them  by-and-by,  Stanley, 
dear.  I'm  sure  she  won't  forget  them,  you 
see!" 

In  order  that  he  might  be  made  to  see  that 
she  had  not  forgotten  them,  a  journey  was 
made  to  Covent  Garden  as  soon  as  Stanley 


could  be  left  with  Mr.  Bligh.  A  journey  made 
in  despair,  almost  by  a  heart-sick  little  'wife — 
a  weary  little  nurse;  and  though  the  roses 
were  dear  that  day,  Stanley's  eyes  were  cheered 
shortly  by  a  group  of  them  as  freshly  white,  as 
richly  crimson,  as  the  bunch  "Mrs.  Claude 
"Walsingham  had  sent  to  him  first,"  Marian 
said,  simply.  From  that  day  forth  Stanley  had 
no  reason  to  complain  that  "  she  never  sent  the 
roses."  The  roses  were  always  there,  though 
Mrs.  Claude  Walsingham  was  in  the  Highlands 
enjoying  herself  very  much  ;  and  poor  Marian 
was  often  on  the  brink  of  bankruptcy.  He 
hungered  and  thirsted  for  the  flowers,  in  a  way 
that  made  Marian  lie  awake  frequently,  during 
the  few  short  hours  of  the  night  in  which  he 
did  not  need  her  to  attend  upon  him,  when  she 
was  free  to  take  repose — in  a  way  that  made 
her  lie  awake  marvelling  half  fearfully  as  to 
how  the  supply  should  be  kept  up  to  the  end 
— the  woeful  end  that  would  come. 

Claude  Walsiugham  and  his  wife  were  having 
a  very  pleasant  time  of  it  in  Scotland.  The 
grouse  were  plentiful  this  year,  and  the  dog 
Jack  had  lent  Claude  for  the  season  was  as  good 
a  pointer  as  had  ever  hooked  his  leg  in  the  air, 
or  done  a  field  off  into  huge  diamond  squares 
with  an  equally  intelligent  fellow.  The  lodge 
Claude  had  taken  was  tolerably  replete  with 
creature  comforts  too.  It  was  airily  furnished, 
but  there  was  no  lack  of  soft  seats  in  it,  and 
now  that  Bella  had  Claude  with  her  constantly, 
she  did  not  care  so  much  for  books  from 
Mudie's. 

They  were  leading  what  Major  Walsingham 
called  a  thoroughly  "jolly  "  life.  Bella  did  not 
knock  up,  and  afflict  him  by  a  display  of  fine- 
ladyism,  as  to  fatigue,  on  or  without  the  small- 
est provocation.  She  approved  herself  capable 
of  taking  a  great  deal  of  pedestrian  e  xercise 
without  being  a  mere  sleepy  nuisance  in  the 
evening  in  consequence  of  the  same.  They  got 
on  so  well  alone  in  the  wilds,  up  in  their  High- 
land shooting-box,  in  fact,  that  the  receipt  of 
letters  and  papers  became  a  mere  bore  to  them, 
and  consequently  they  did  not  open  the  latter 
very  often  until  they  were  three  or  four  days 
old. 

There  were  certain  letters  which  they  felt  it 
to  be  their  bounden  duty  to  open  and  peruse,  to 
read  and  inwardly  digest,  unpleasant  as  that 
duty  was  sometimes;  and  these  were  letters 
from  the  dowager  Mrs.  Walsingham.  Claude's 
mother  was  desperately  affectionate  and  discon- 
tented in  her  epistles. 

"She  calls  me  her  'dearest  child,'  and  makes 
me  feel  like  a  criminal  for  being  her  ehild-in-law 
even,"  Bella  said  to  her  husband  one  morning, 
after  reading  a  cross-barred  letter  in  the  palest 
ink,  and  with  the  deepest  border  of  black  that 
mortal  eyes  had  ever  beheld. 

"Why?"  Claude  asked.  "No.  thank  you" 
(as  Bella  made  a  feint  of  handing  him  the  letter), 
"I  never  read  plaid  effusions." 

"  Oh !  it's  hard  to  say ;  the  whole  tone  of  the 
letter  is  calculated  to  depress  the  recipient ;  one 
has  a  vague  sense  of  being  guilty  of  some  un- 
discovered crime  while  reading  it." 

"  You  may  tell  me  the  letter  in  brief  bits—- 
but mind,  Bella,  make  them  very  brief  I" 

So  cautioned,  Bella  commenced — 

"  Well,  now,  here  she  says,  '  I  went  down  to 


ON  GUARD. 


163 


the  Vale  House  yesterday,  to  see  about  things ; 
it  is  time  that  at  least  my  bed-room  and  own 
sitting-room  (humble  as  they  are)  should  be 
ready.  I  know  it  to  be  Claude's  wish  that, 
though  very  differently,  I  shall  be  comfortably 
'lodged,  so  I  did  venture  to  tell  Thompson  to 
mend  the  bell  in  the  sitting-room.'  Now, 
Claude,  fancy !  as  if  your  mother  didn't  know 
that  she  was  free  to  have  a  whole  peal  of  bells 
in  every  room  in  her  house,  if  she  liked. 

"  And  free  to  ring  her  servants  out  of  their 
minds,  into  the  bargain,"  Claude  replied,  with  a 
laugh.  "  What  a  lark,  to  be  sure  1" 

"  Ah !  but  a  lot  of  it  isn't  a  lark.  Just  listen 
to  this :  '  I  remembered,  when  Farmer  Hopkins 
and  his  wife  (good  worthy  people)  lived  there, 
they  were  always  complaining  of  the  damp,  and 
I  took  the  precaution  of  wrapping  myself  up  in 
my  sable  cloak,  and  putting  on  goloshes,  before 
I  went  into  the  house.  Something  must  have 
struck  a  chill  to  me,  however,  for  I  have  a  tick- 
ling in  my  throat  to-day,  that  warns  me  of  the 
approach  of  bronchitis,  and  a  stabbing  pain  in 
my  left  temple,  that  bids  me  beware  of  neural- 
gia.' There!  I  feel  that  these  preliminary 
symptoms  of  your  mother's  will  make  my  life 
miserable,  Claude." 

"  You  had  better  get  to  disregard  them,  my 
dear,  that  is  all  I  can  say." 

"Do  you  really  think  the  Yale  House  is 
damp?" 

"  Nonsense !  damp — no !" 

"Then  why  should  Mrs.  Walsingham  go 
down  to  it '  in  a  sable  cloak  and  goloshes  ?'  " 

Claude  roared.  "The  damp  is  her  pet 
grievance  at  present,  my  child ;  don't  you  want 
to  deprive  her  of  it  until  you're  ready  to  give 
her  another."  Then  he  added  more  gravely, 
"  You  must  know,  Bell,  that  it  is  only  to  us 
that  my  mother  Avill  talk  of  the  black  beetles 
and  the  draught,  and  the  damp,  and  the  missing 
bells  ;  to  every  one  else  the  Vale  House  will  be 
a  little  palace  of  delight" 

"Bat  hearing  of  all  those  disagreeables  does 
exactly  what  she  intends  it  to  do — makes  me 
feel  guilty,"  Bella  replied. 

"  Well,  I  hope  to  God  you  will  never  have 
greater  reason  to  feel  guilty  about  anything,  my 
darling,"  her  husbaud  replied,  opening  the 
Times  (that  was  several  days  old)  as  he  spoke. 

It  is  in  the  columns  of  this  world-renowned 
institution  that  we  come  upon  our  greatest 
shocks  in  real  life.  There  is  nothing  inartistic, 
therefore,  in  making  the  most  severe  shocks 
emanate  from  thence,  in  the  mimic  life  with 
which  it  is  the  novelist's  province  to  deal. 

Claude  Walsingham  opened  the  Times,  and 
after  glancing  over  it  for  a  couple  of  minutes  or 
so,  he  let  it  fall  with  his  hands  on  the  table,  and 
uttered  an  exclamation,  a  short  one — "  God  1" 

"  What's  the  matter,"  Bella  said.  Then  find- 
ing that  he  did  not  answer  her,  that  he  looked 
shocked  into  such  pallor  as  she  had  never  seen 
on  Claude's  face  before,  she  jumped  up  and  went 
over  to  him,  and  attempted  to  take  the  paper 
ont  of  his  hand. 

"What  is  it,  say  ?     What  is  it,  Claude ?'' 

"Keep  off  for  an  instant!"  he  said;  but  he 
did  not  say  it  at  all  roughly.     Her  soul  began  , 
to  shake  within  her. 

"Claude,  Claude,  tell  me!" 

"He's  dead  then!"  Claude  began  in  a  loud  ! 


voice,  that  ended  in  a  big  choking  sob  as  hia 
head  fell  upon  his  arms,  and  tears  oozed  from 
his  eyes.  Then  Bella  checked  the  utterence 
of  the  wail  that  was  in  her  own  heart,  as  she 
bent  over  and  attempted  to  soothe  her  husband 
in  his  agony. 

He  remembered  all  things  with  such  a  dread- 
ful distinctness  now.  His  boyish  days  with 
Stanley,  and  the  friendship  that  had  been  be- 
tween them  in  their  riper  years.  He  remem- 
bered how  love  had  battled  with  doubt  in  their 
hearts.  How  Stanley  had  believed  their  com- 
pact to  be  too  sacred  a  thing  to  be  foully  soiled ; 
and  how  he  (Claude)  had  falsified  that  belief. 
He  remembered  all  these  things  well ;  but  bet- 
ter than  them  all,  he  remembered  that  he  had 
loved  this  man  who  was  dead,  and  that  this 
man  was  dead. 

It  was  a  crushing  conviction.  Do  what  he 
would  now,  the  late  hardness,  the  worse  than 
indifference  that  he  had  shown,  could  never  be 
altered.  He  was  utterly  bowed — bowed  and 
subdued,  as  entirely  as  any  woman  could  have 
been,  by  the  stunning  weight  of  a  most  over- 
powering remorse.  His  superior  scruples;  his 
false  fears  as  to  future  intercourse ;  his  careful 
avoidance  of  contamination,  were  all  shown  to 
be  uncalled  for,  unneeded,  in  such  a  solemn 
way,  that  the  sight  of  that  futility  nearly  burst 
his  heart. 

As  for  what  Bella  felt  when  she  read  the 
paragraph  that  had  bent  her  husband's  head, 
that  may  not  be  told  too  clearly.  She  had 
known,  she  had  felt  sure  of  ''that"  for  some 
time  which  had  come  upon  Claude  as  a  shock. 
She  was  more  than  sorry,  she  was  more  than 
grieved!  But  there  was  just  this  unction 
which  she  could  lay  to  her  soul — she  had  parted 
from  the  dead  man  in  kindness.  Claude  knew 
now  that  he  had  turned  from  Stanley  in  scorn, 
when,  for  his  manhood,  he  should  have  gone  to 
Stanley  in  humanity.  Her  husband's  remorse 
took  Bella  away  from  too  much  thought  of  her 
lost  lover's  evil  fate. 

During  the  whole  of  that  day  Claude  could 
do  nothing  but  regret.  He  was  as  inefficient  in 
his  first  sorrow  as  any  woman  could  have  been, 
as  nervously  uncertain  "  what  to  do  at  all "  at 
first,  and  then  "  what  to  do  for  the  best."  The 
following  day  he  vainly  essayed  to  try  and  act 
as  if  this  "had  never  been,"  to  go  out  shooting 
as  usual,  to  "shake  off"  the  thought  of  that 
which  had  unmanned  him.  But  he  failed !  He 
failed  entirely.  His  better  nature  triumphed, 
and  in  the  evening  he  said  to  his  wife — 

"Bella,  dear!  we'll  go  to  London  to-morrow. 
I'll  go — to — his  funeral,  and  you  shall  see  after 
his  poor  little  wife." 

They  talked  freely  of  the  miserable  business 
after  that.  Claude  was  all  the  loving  old  friend 
again,  instead  of  being  the  successful,  but,  not- 
withstanding that  success,  the  needlessly  em- 
bittered rival.  They  made  plans  to  assuage  so 
much  of  Marian's  woe  as  might  be  assuaged, 
aud  in  speaking  of  her  Claude  lapsed  for  a 
minute  into  injustice. 

"  Poor  little  thing!  I  pity  her  very  much  of 
course;  but  as  she  must  have  been  utterly  in- 
capable of  appreciating  Stanley,  I  have  not  the 
least  doubt  that  the  consideration  she'll  receive 
as  his  widow  will  quite  reconcile  her  to  having 
been  his  wife  for  so  short  a  time." 


164 


ON  GUARD. 


"I  don't  suppose  she  did  appreciate  him," 
Bella  rejoined.  She  was  conscious  that  she  her- 
self had  riot  appreciated  him,  and  she  did  not 
accredit  Marian  with  higher  powers  than  she 
had  possessed  in  that  respect. 

The  Times  in  which  they  had  read  of  his 
death  was  five  or  six  days  old.  Two  mor.- 
days  were  wasted  in  coming  to  a  decision  as  to 
"  what  they  should  do."  The  result  was  that 
Stanley  Villarg  had  been  dead  nine  days  when 
they  came  at  length  to  the  door  of  his  house  to 
inquire  for  his  widow. 

The  little  house  looked  very  gloomy  and  deso- 
late when  the  door  was  opened  by  an  old  wo- 
man, and  they  stepped  in. 

"Is  Mrs.  Stanley  Villars  within?"  Claude 
asked,  while  Bella  began  to  cry. 

"  Are  you  any  relatives  of  the  late  yonng 
gentleman's  what's  gone  ?"  the  woman  asked, 
dubiously,  by  way  of  answer. 

Claude  felt  like  a  brother  towards  Stanley 
now ;  in  addition  to  which  feeling,  he  thought 
that  it  would  save  trouble  to  say  "  Yes." 

"  Then  I  am  to  tell  you,"  the  woman  replied, 
slowly,  ''that  the  young  woman  who  lived 
here  is  gone  away,  and  don't  want  to  trouble 
you  ever— no  "  (correcting  herself)  "I  wasn't  to 
say  that — this  is  it,  the  young  woman  is  gone 
away,  and  she  wished  it  to  be  known  to  her 
gentleman's  relatives,  if  they  ever  did  chance 
to  come  nigh  to  inquire,  while  I  was  here,  that 
the  young  gentleman  never  disgraced  him- 
self by  marrying  her — poor  lamb !"  the  woman 
wound  up  with,  heartily. 

It  was  a  staggering  surprise  to  them  both. 
They  could  only  ask  a  few  incoherent  questions, 
and  then  go  away  discomfited.  As  they  were 
leaving  the  door,  Bella  said — 

"Claude,  she's  a  noble  little  creature,  mis- 
taken as  she  is." 

"  How  do  you  mean  ?  Poor  girl !  God  knows 
I  would  have  judged  her  leniently  enough,  and 
done  anything  for  her,"  he  replied. 

'•You  don't  quite  see  what  I  do,  yet,"  she 
answered.  "I  feel  as  sure  as  that  I'm  your 
wife,  that  she  was  Stanley  Villars' ;  it's  all  of  a 
piece  with  her  wishing  one  day  that  she  could 
have  been  unmarried  to  him.  She  has  sacri- 
ficed her  reputation  in  order  that  his  family 
may  not  think  he  disgraced  himself  by  a  low 
marriage." 


As  she  was  saying  this,  Lady  Villars'  car- 
riage  drew  up ;  and  her  ladyship,  robed  in  the 
deepest  mourning,  leant  out  of  it  to  speak  to 
them. 

';  Have  you  heard  of  our  gnef  ?"  sh  *  asked, 
with  a  little  quiver  in  h  r  voice,  that  told  its 
<  wn  tale  of  the  tears  that  had  been  shed,  and 
Bella  saw  that  Carrie's  fair  face  was  almost 
seamed  by  sorrow. 

''We  have  just  been  there,"  Bella  answered. 

"  Of  that  too ;  but  ours  is  a  double  grief, 
Mrs.  Walsingham ;  my  little  boy  is  dead,"  the 
poor  bereaved  mother  cried. 

Then  Bella  told  her  how  her  visit  was  well- 
intentioned,  but  too  late.  "  Stanley's  widow 
was  gone,"  she  said ;  and  then  she  gave  the 
message  Stanley's  widow  had  left,  as  it  had 
been  given  to  her. 

"Who  could  have  foreseen  this  ?"  Lady  Villars 
cried  bitterly.  "  It  will  half  kill  Gerald  to  find 
that  he  can't  make  any  amends." 

"  She  meant  well,  I  have  no  doubt ;  but  it 
was  a  very  imbecile  precaution  to  take,  to  cut 
herself  off  from  her  husband's  family  just  now, 
for  Bella  says  there  is  no  doubt  about  the  mar- 
riage. A  very  imbecile  precaution  indeed," 
Claude  said  sorrowfully. 

"  Very !"  Bella  said  emphatically,  "  as  all  the 
precautions  have  been  that  we  have  all  taken 
about  each  other ;  even  those  dear  Stanley  took 
himself,  from  the  ver/first.  We  have  all  been 
on  guard  against  the  wrong  thing." 

"  He  is  dead  now,  and  the  acknowledgment 
of  it  can't  help  him,"  Lady  Villars  said;  "  but  we 
have  all  been  horribly  hard  to  him." 

"  Let  his  memory  make  us  softer  to  those  who 
are  left,"  Bella  replied;  and  then  they  went 
their  several  ways. 

But  for  all  the  toleration  expressed  in  Mrs. 
Claude  Walsingham's  speech,  she  could  not  for- 
bear saying  to  her  husband,  when  they  reached 
their  own  house,  and  found  Rock  awaiting  them 
("  a  dog  that  had  been  left  for  missus  by  a  lady 
in  black,"  the  servant  said) — 

"  Claude !  she  is  the  only  one  who  has  be- 
haved unselfishly  in  the  business — how  much 
better  she  is  than  any  of  us!" 

In  addition,  too,  it  must  be  said,  that  the  black 
beetles  and  the  draughts  and  the  damp  some- 
times bore  hard  upon  her. 


END. 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

RENEWALS  ONLY— TEL.  NO.  642-3405 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


;-  -7    .          -       :  1 

i             LOAN 

H^^i 

IIZZZZ 

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General  Library 
LD2lA-60m-6,'69                             University  of  California 
(J9096slO)476-A-32                                    Berkeley 

Y.CIG2734 


